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VOLUME    XXII. 
LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 


//  was,  not  till  July  21  si  that  Goethe  was  able  to  visit 
' —  Jena  ' ' 

Photogravure  from  the  drawing  by  W.  Friedrich 


i 


%ift  of  ^ci^tlUr 


BY 


Heinrich    Duntzer 

Translated  by 

Percy   E.   Pinkerton 


«*^- 


Edited  bv  Nathan  Haskell  Dole 


Boston    *^    Francis    A.    Niccolls 
&    Company    ^     Publishers 


lEtiition  ©f  (Sranti  Huxr 

This  Ediiio7i  is  Limiled  to   Two  Hundred  and  Fifty 
Copies,  of  which  this  is  copy 

No.      54 


Copyright,  igo2 
By  Francis  A.  Niccoi.ls  &  Co. 


Colonial  ^rc8s 

Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  C.  H.  Simonds  &  Co. 

Boston,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 


n 

Contents  ,  a    ^  ^ 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

Book  I.     Life  at  Home  and  at  School 

I.  From  1723  to  1759 3 

II.     From  1759  to  1766 16 

III.     From  1767  to  1772 24 

Book  II.     The  Duke's  Pupil 

I.  From  1773  to  1775 35 

II.     From  1775  to  1779 47 

III.     From  1779  to  1780 62 

Book  III.     Army  Surgeon  and  Poet 
I.     From  December,   1780,  to  January,  1782         .         .       75 

II.  From  January  to  September,   1782  ....       92 

Book  IV.     The  Fugitive 
I.     From  September  to  December,   1782       .         .         .     109 
II.     From  December,   1782,  to  July,   1783       .         .         .119 

Book  V.     The  Playwright 
I.     From  July,  1783,  to  May,   1784         .         .         .         .139 
II.     From  May,   1784,  to  April,   1785      .         .         .         .157 

Book  VI.     In  Friendship's  Lap 

I.     From  April  to  September,   1785       ....  185 

II.     From  September,   1785,  to  February,  1787     .         .  194 

III.     From  February  to  July,  1787 206 

Book  VII.     Fresh  Fields  of  Action 

I.     From  July,   1787,  to  January,  1788          .  .  .  219 

II.  From  February  to  November,  1788          .  .  .  235 
III.     From  November,   1788,  to  May,   1789        .  .  .  256 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

Book  VIII.     The  Professorship 

I.     From  May,   1789,  to  February,   1790        .  .         .271 

II.     From  February,  1790,  to  October,   1791  .        ,     299 

III.     Froji  October,  1791,  to  August,  1793     .  .        .     317 

Book  IX.     Visiting  Home 
I.     From  August,  1793,  to  May,   1794  ....     341 

Book  X.     On  the  Height 

I.     From  May,   1794,  to  April,   1796      .         .  .         ,357 

II.     From  April,   1796,  to  April,  1799    .         .  .         .386 

III.  From  April,  1799,  to  March.   1804.         .  .         .425 

IV.  From  April,   1804,  to  May,   1805       ,         .  .         .479 


The  Life  of  Schiller. 


List   of  Illustrations 


PAGE 

"It  was  not  till  July   21st  that  Goethe  was  able   to 
VISIT  Jena"     {See page  362)         .        .        .       Frontispiece 

Schiller  Eeading  the  "Robbers" 62 

Schiller  in  Loschwitz 194 

Schiller  in  Stuttgart,   1794 349 

Portrait  of  Schiller 426 


Life  of  Schiller 


Book   I. 
Life  at  Home   and  at  School 


The   Life   of  Schiller 


CHAPTER    I. 

FROM  1723  TO  1759. 

If  we  would  have  knowledge  of  the  ancestry  of  our 
ideal  poet  of  freedom,  we  must,  for  the  first,  turn  to 
Bittenfeld,  a  parish  of  some  importance,  situate  north- 
east of  where  the  Neckar  is  joined  by  the  Rems. 
There,  in  the  latter  half  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
lived  John  Caspar  Schiller,  by  trade  a  baker,  but  also 
holding  legal  othce ;  he  migrated  thither,  it  is  thought, 
from  the  village  of  Groszheppach,  which  lies  to  the 
southeast  of  Bittenfeld,  on  the  vine-clad  banks  of 
the  Rems.  It  may  be  that  he  was  son  to  Ulrich 
Schiller,  whose  father,  James  George,  was  born  at 
Groszheppach  in  1587.  The  name  Schiller  was  a 
widely  spread  one.  In  South  Germany,  at  the  beginning 
of  the  fifteenth  century,  a  master-singer,  one  Jorg 
Schiller  (Schilher,  Schilcher)  won  himself  a  name ;  his 
so-called  "  notes  "  or  "  tones  "  were  specially  admired. 
The  name  literally  signifies  squint-eyed,  squinting. 
Farther  on  we  shall  see  that  the  Rems  Schillers  were 
probably  related  to  a  Tyrolese  family  of  rank.  John 
Caspar  Schiller,  of  Bittenfeld  fame,  died  in  1687,  aged 
thirty-eight.  John,  his  son,  who,  keeping  to  old  custom, 
had  followed  in  his  father's  trade,  rose  to  the  rank  of 

3 


4  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

mayor.  On  the  30th  of  October,  1708,  at  the  age 
of  twenty-eight,  he  niairied ;  and  on  the  27th  of 
October,  1728,  was  born  to  him  his  eighth  and  young- 
est child,  John  Caspar,  the  father  of  our  poet.  It  was 
intended  tliat  he  should  enter  the  Church,  his  elder 
brother  succeeding  to  the  business.  From  a  private 
tutor  he  had  already  gained  a  first  knowledge  of  Latin, 
when,  at  the  age  of  ten,  his  father  died.  This  event 
robbed  him  of  all  hope  of  receiving  a  scholarly  educa- 
tion ;  his  parent  was  but  of  slender  fortune,  and  had 
to  leave  many  of  his  children  without  provision.  The 
boy's  mother  would  have  made  a  farmer  of  him,  but 
his  aims  being  once  set  on  something  higher,  he  did 
not  rest  until,  at  the  end  of  five  years,  she  had  ap- 
prenticed him  to  a  monastery  barber  of  the  hamlet 
of  Denkendorf,  with  whom  he  was  to  study  surgery. 
Xor  could  the  most  menial  duties  crush  out  his  love 
of  learning;  contact  with  the  pupils  of  the  lower 
monastery  school  brought  what  little  Latin  he  knew 
into  use,  and  from  the  provost  himself  he  gained  no 
slight  acquaintance  with  botany.  At  the  close  of  his 
apprenticeship,  he  took  service  wdth  a  barber  at  Back- 
nang,  in  this  way  to  earn  for  himself  means  of  travel. 
At  length,  after  journeying  about,  he  found  employ- 
ment at  a  surgeon's  in  Lindau,  on  the  Lake  of  Con- 
stance. Soon,  however,  his  master  died,  when  he  went 
to  Nordlingen,  where  he  became  apprentice  to  one 
Cramer,  a  surgeon  of  the  town ;  together  with  the  son 
of  his  employer,  he  studied  French,  and  also  took 
lessons  in  fencing. 

When,  upon  the  death  of  that  unfortunate  monarch, 
Charles  the  Seventh,  the  Frangipani  Hussars  passed 
through  Nordliugen  on  their  way  to  the  Netherlands, 
Schiller  was  suddenly  seized  with  a  desire  to  join  their 
ranks  as  regimental  surgeon.  No  vacancy  offered 
itself ;  nevertheless  he  was  permitted  to  accompany 
the  regiment.     Of  the  money  paid  to  him  for  prov- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  S 

ender,  he  managed  to  save  somewhat ;  the  fees  for 
two  successful  cures  served  to  support  him  while  in 
Brussels.  Between  that  place  and  Charleroi  he  fell 
into  the  hands  of  the  invading  French.  Being  fortu- 
nate enough  to  escape  execution  as  a  spy,  he  was  forced 
at  Ghent  to  enter  their  ranks  as  a  private  soldier. 
Thus  he  once  more  came  to  Brussels ;  upon  the  cession 
of  Antwerp  and  Bergen,  he  was  among  those  who 
advanced  on  Charleroi.  So  far  had  he  won  the  trust 
and  confidence  of  his  superiors,  that  to  him  was 
allotted  the  duty  of  collecting  rations  from  the  sur- 
rounding villages.  Fortunately,  while  thus  engaged, 
the  Austrians  took  him  prisoner ;  they  at  once  gave 
him  a  free  pass  to  his  regiment,  which,  after  much 
peril  and  hardship,  he  reached,  shortly  before  the  dis- 
astrous battle  of  Eocoux.  Now  at  length,  after  many 
a  misadventure,  the  post  for  which  he  had  longed 
became  his;  he  was  appointed  regimental  surgeon 
with  a  salary  of  thirty  gulden,  besides  two  ducats 
medicine-money.  At  the  outset,  however,  the  cost  of 
horse  and  uniform  necessitated  an  expenditure  of  two 
hundred  gulden,  a  loan  that  he  was  able  to  repay  with 
the  proceeds  derived  from  extraneous  practice. 

In  April,  1747,  the  regiment  was  again  under  orders. 

"  My  inborn  love  of  incessant  activity,"  he  himself 
relates,  "  led  me  on  to  ask  ofl&cial  permission  whether, 
in  common  with  the  sergeants,  I  might  conduct  differ- 
ent expeditions  and  reconnaissances.  Under  the  com- 
mand of  an  officer,  this  was  accorded  to  me,  and  many 
were  the  rides  I  had,  often  returning  with  booty,  of 
which,  however,  I  was  now  and  again  despoiled." 

Once,  when  the  regiment  was  attacked,  Schiller's 
horse  was  shot  from  under  him.  He  remarks : 
"  Wounds  received  in  action  or  in  single  combat,  if 
they  do  not  prevent  the  use  of  one's  limbs,  should  not 
be  heeded,  much  less  bragged  of ;  the  case  is  simply 
one  of  give  and  take." 


6  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

The  llittmeister  of  his  troop  became  so  attached  to 
the  brave  aud  enterprising  surgeon,  that  he  would  not 
part  from  him,  even  making  him  his  companion  on 
a  visit  to  The  Hague.  Maastricht  was  at  that  time 
closely  besieged  by  the  French,  when,  on  30th  of 
April,  1748,  the  peace  preliminaries  were  published 
at  Aix-la-Chapelle.  Schiller,  then  at  Oudenbosch  with 
the  so-called  Little  Army,  was  afterward  quartered 
with  his  Eittmeister  at  Borckel.  They  came  to  Lon- 
don together,  returning  whence,  they  spent  a  short 
time  at  Amsterdam,  at  The  Hague.  In  this  way  John 
Caspar  managed  to  see  a  good  bit  of  the  world.  Most 
of  his  regiment  was  now  disbanded ;  he  felt  a  longing 
for  home,  where  in  Neckarrems  his  sister  was  anxious 
he  should  marry  the  daughter  of  the  resident  surgeon 
there. 

On  the  4th  of  March,  1749,  riding  his  own  horse, 
he  left  Borckel,  and  ten  days  later  reached  Marbach, 
a  pretty  little  town  situate  on  the  vine-clad  slopes 
that  stretch  down  to  the  Neckar.  It  was  here  that 
his  married  sister  lived,  Eva  Margareta  Stolpp.  He 
put  up  at  the  sign  of  the  "  Golden  Lion,"  an  inn  near 
the  Niklasthor,  now  No.  260  Niklasthorstrasse.  Georg 
Friedrich  Kodweis,  the  landlord,  a  man  of  fifty  sum- 
mers, followed  the  trade  of  his  fathers ;  he  was  a  baker, 
but  likewise  held  the  appointment  of  overseer  on  the 
ducal  estate.  His  wife  was  still  Hving;  Elizabeth 
Dorothea,  their  sole  remaining  daughter,  born  on 
December  13,  1732,  was  then  a  slim  yet  sturdy 
damsel,  as  active  as  she  was  vivacious.  Her  hair  was 
red  in  colour ;  she  had  a  broad  forehead,  with  large, 
soft  eyes ;  nor  could  freckles  rob  her  countenance  of 
the  charm  that  lay  in  its  expression  of  gentle,  kindly 
benevolence.  The  army  surgeon,  now  in  his  twenty- 
sixth  year,  was  strong  and  stalwart,  with  eyes  that 
sparkled  beneath  a  lofty  brow ;  his  soldierhke  bearing, 
his   downright,  decided   manner,  the  evident  honesty 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  7 

of  purpose  with  which  he  sought  civil  employment  — 
all  this  could  not  but  tell  in  the  young  man's  favour. 
After  a  visit  to  his  mother  in  Murr,  his  brother  in 
Bittenfeld,  and  his  sister  in  Neckarrems,  and  finding 
that  the  bride  chosen  for  him  was  already  another's, 
John  Caspar  determined  to  settle  in  Marbach,  where 
a  marriage  with  the  gentle  and  discreet  daughter  of 
the  innkeeper  —  who  seemingly  was  most  thriving  and 
well-to-do  —  offered  every  prospect  of  a  happy  future. 
Shortly  before  his  wedding,  which,  as  one  of  deter- 
mined mind  who  forbears  to  trifle  with  his  feelings  but 
presses  to  his  goal,  he  made  every  effort  to  hasten  on, 
he  went  to  Ludwigsburg.  On  the  11th  of  July  he 
successfully  passed  a  government  medical  examination 
held  in  that  place.  Eleven  days  later  he  was  married. 
His  wife  brought  him  no  money  as  her  dower  — 
merely  property  to  the  value  of  188  gulden.  In  hard 
cash  John  Caspar  possessed  215  gulden,  24  kreuzer; 
this  sum  he  made  over  to  his  father-in-law.  As 
among  the  silver  ornaments  of  his  household  he  re- 
served those  given  to  him  by  his  mother,  —  a  silver- 
mounted  walking-stick,  a  silver  scarf-ring  and  seal. 
Upon  this  latter  was  engraved  the  family  crest  and 
coat  of  arms.  In  the  left  field  above  the  helmet  is 
an  arrow  pointing  upwards ;  in  the  right,  a  unicorn, 
beneath  which  is  a  bar.  To  the  right  and  left  of  the 
coat  of  arms  are  some  leaves,  which,  judging  from 
the  berries,  are  intended  for  laurel-leaves.  When 
Schiller  had  his  crest  engraved  after  that  of  his  father, 
many  laurels  of  quite  another  kind  were  added  to  both 
sides  of  the  shield,  as  also  to  the  helmet.  We  find 
that  a  coat  of  arms  precisely  similar  to  this  was 
possessed  by  the  Schiller  von  Herdern  family,  of  the 
Tyrol ;  their  name  figures  in  the  peerage  as  far  back 
as  1601 ;  possibly,  therefore,  the  two  Schiller  families 
were  in  some  way  related.  Indeed,  if  the  leaves 
engraved  on  the  seal  belonging  to  Schiller's  father  are 


8  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

intended  for  laurel-leaves,  one  might  almost  believe 
that  the  Hems  Schillers  retained  the  crest  of  their 
ancestor  the  master-singer,  who,  naturally  enough, 
could  have  had   laurels  on  his  scutcheon. 

But  to  return  to  the  poet's  father.  Among  the  nine 
books  he  possessed,  most  of  them  medical  ones,  are 
cited  "  Erkenntniss  sein  selbst "  and  a  Wiirtemberg 
Hymnal,  while  the  hst  of  his  surgical  instruments 
includes  a  tin  basin  for  shaving  purposes,  four  good 
razors,  a  pair  of  tweezers  with  which  to  draw  teeth, 
and  two  lancets.  The  spirits  of  wine,  tinctures,  and 
other  "  specie,"  together  with  the  bottles  and  phials 
containing  them,  were  valued  at  seven  gulden,  thirty 
kreuzer.  He  had  sold  his  horse  ;  nevertheless  he  kept 
"  the  Hungarian  saddle,  with  saddle-cloth  and  trap- 
pings." Among  his  clothes  we  notice  a  wedding-coat 
made  of  "  steel-coloured  cloth,"  an  entire  suit,  less  new, 
of  the  same  material,  a  pair  of  silk  stockings,  a  hat  for 
best,  besides  an  old  one  with  edging  round  it. 

He  took  up  his  residence  at  the  innkeeper's  house, 
where  he  practised  as  a  surgeon  ;  but  it  was  not  until 
the  end  of  September  that  he  became  a  Marbach  citi- 
zen. All  too  soon  it  came  about  that,  owing  to  improv- 
ident speculation  and  expenditure  in  connection  with 
the  ducal  property,  his  father-in-law  contracted  debts 
that  his  entire  fortune  scarcely  sufficed  to  discharge. 
By  various  small  loans,  as  also  from  his  son-in-law's 
small  capital,  he  for  a  time  was  helped.  But  within 
three  months  the  affair  become  public.  Schiller  pur- 
chased part  of  the  house,  in  such  way  lessening  the 
amount  owing  to  him.  Yet  matters  grew  from  bad  to 
worse,  and  residence  in  Marbach  became  for  him, 
as  a  man  of  honour,  less  and  less  tolerable.  Since  the 
finding  of  a  post  as  regimental  surgeon  would  be  no 
easy  task,  half  in  despair,  and  being  merely  anxious  to 
get  quit  of  the  place,  he  joined  the  newly  formed  bat- 
talion of  the   Prince   Louis  infantry   regiment,  under 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  9 

Colonel  Camaigi-e,  as  quartermaster.  This  was  in  the 
early  part  of  1753.  Thus,  though  contmuing  to  keep 
a  home  for  his  wife  under  her  father's  roof,  he  was 
mostly  away  from  it  himself.  But  before  long  the  inn 
had  to  be  sold,  and  Kodweis,  with  his  daughter,  took 
lodgings  at  a  baker's  named  Pressel ;  the  house  they 
occupied  is  now  No.  280  Niklasthorstrasse.  It  was 
soon  Schiller's  lot  to  be  driven  far  from  family  and 
home. 

The  dissolute  Duke  Karl  Eugene,  swayed  by  a  two- 
fold thirst  for  power  and  plunder,  in  a  treaty  concluded 
on  March  31,  1757,  \vith  France,  otfered  to  put  five 
regiments  at  her  disposal,  wherewith  to  oppose  Prussia, 
whose  great  king  had  once  shown  for  the  duke  such 
friendly  feeling.  In  vain  did  the  States  implore  him 
not  to  lead  their  soldiery  against  the  Frederick  whom 
they  held  in  honour ;  prayers  went  up  in  the  churches 
for  the  prince's  enlightenment ;  it  was  sought  to  spur 
on  the  troops  to  open  rebellion.  On  the  20th  of  June, 
at  Stuttgart,  they  mutinied  during  parade ;  of  three 
thousand  recruits  there  remained  but  four  hundred. 
Schiller,  being  solely  bent  upon  advancement  in  the 
service,  remained  firm  in  his  allegiance  to  the  duke, 
although  it  was  against  his  coreligionists  that  he  had 
to  fight.  The  duke's  mainstay  was  one  Colonel  Eieger, 
Privy  Councillor  of  War,  and  son  of  the  once  so  favour- 
ite Stuttgart  divine  —  a  hard,  inflexible  man.  Already 
on  August  10th,  under  the  duke's  guidance,  the  troops 
left  their  encampments  between  Ludwigsburg  and 
Pflugfelden,  which  they  had  occupied  for  more  than  a 
month.  While  here,  Schiller  had  had  easy  opportunity 
of  visiting  his  wife.  Ptisen  by  this  time  to  the  rank  of 
ensign  and  adjutant,  the  parting  was  of  added  bitter- 
ness to  the  earnest  man,  now  that  first,  after  many  a 
year,  he  could  look  forward  to  the  joy  of  fatherhood. 
Disturbances  took  place  already  on  the  14th,  between 
Plochingen  and  Geistingen,  as  it  was  a  religious  war 


lo  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

that  people  dreaded.  On  September  6th,  signs  of  revolt 
were  again  manifest  at  Linz,  wliither  Ensign  Schiller 
was  gone  with  a  section  of  the  troops.  His  wife,  two 
days  before,  had  given  birth  to  a  daughter,  named 
Christophina  Friderika  after  her  father's  comrade, 
Christoph  Friedrich  Gerstner,  and  Elizabeth  after  her 
mother.  Burgomaster  Harmann,  Justice  of  Marbach, 
stood  godfather ;  as  godmothers,  the  infant  had  the 
widow  of  Ehrenmann,  the  collaborateur,  and  a  Friiulein 
Sommer  of  Stuttgart. 

From  Linz  the  march  lay  in  the  direction  of  Silesia. 
At  the  storming  of  Schweidnitz  on  November  12th,  the 
Bavarians  and  the  Wiirtembergers  won  for  themselves 
distinction.  After  a  triumpliant  encounter,  Breslau 
capitulated.  Not  so  at  Leuthen,  however,  where 
Frederick  himself  ^  attacked  his  enemy's  left  wing, 
composed  of  the  Wlirtemberg,  Bavarian,  and  Wurz- 
burg  troops.  The  Wiirtembergers  made  but  a  sorry 
stand  ;  all  fled  ;  Schiller  lost  his  horse,  and  was  like  to 
have  lost  his  life  in  a  swamp  near  Breslau,  in  which, 
on  awaking  at  early  morning,  he  found  himself  frozen 
above  the  knee.  Well-nigh  half  of  the  troops  had 
perished  ere  they  took  up  their  winter  quarters  in 
Bohemia,  where  soon  a  fearful  pestilence  broke  out. 
Here,  in  Leonberg,  Schiller  filled  the  post  vacant  by 
the  decease  of  the  regimental  surgeon  ;  and,  chaplains 
being  scarce,  he  likewise  undertook,  by  order  of  the 
general,  the  reading  of  certain  prayers,  and  the  singing 
of  such  hymns  as  were  suitable.  By  dint  of  great 
moderation  in  diet,  as  also  by  taking  continual  exer- 
cise, he  guarded  himself  against  infection.  Shortly 
previous  to  the  army's  retreat  on  April  1st,  he  was  pro- 
moted to  the  rank  of  lieutenant,  in  recognition  of  his 
faithful  services.  It  was  a  gloomy  home-coming  for 
the  soldiers ;  of  six  thousand  men  but  nineteen  hun- 
dred were  left.  Vainly  had  the  States  meanwhile 
protested  against  universal   conscription ;  Rieger    and 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  ii 

Count  Montmartin,  the  newly  made  Cabinet  minister 
carried  through  their  measure  by  sheer  force.  That, 
the  duke  had  broken  solemn  treaties  gave  but  slight 
concern  to  Lieutenant  Schiller ;  nor  did  the  country's 
distress  trouble  him ;  he  failed  not  to  serve  his  power- 
ful leader  faithfully  and  unswervingly,  thanking  God, 
who  had  brought  him  home  in  safety  from  the  fight, 
and  who  had  blessed  him,  likewise,  with  a  little  daugh- 
ter. With  his  father-in-law,  however,  things  grew 
worse  and  worse ;  and  Frau  Schiller  must  needs  suffer 
bitterly  thereby.  Their  abode  was  again  changed  to  a 
house  owned  by  one  Scholkopf,  beyond  the  Niklasthor 
(now  256  Mklasthorstrasse).  Here  the  street  widens 
into  a  small  quadrangle  that,  with  its  fountain  sur- 
mounted by  the  figure  of  a  fabulous  wild  man,  almost 
gains  the  dignity  of  a  square.  The  house,  on  the  side 
facing  the  street,  had  six  windows,  three  on  the  ground 
floor  and  three  on  the  first  story.  Scliiller's  wife  occu- 
pied the  lower  room. 

Only  for  a  short  time  could  the  lieutenant  enjoy 
sight  and  speech  of  those  he  loved.  The  duke  had 
been  hoping  that  the  empress  would  entrust  him  with 
the  supreme  command ;  but  she  refused  all  dealings 
with  the  mutinous,  heretical  troops  of  one  who,  in 
default  of  an  electorship,  would  claim  Ulm  and  Nurn- 
berg  as  reward  for  his  services.  She  bade  the  Wiir- 
tembergers  turn  to  the  French.  They  encamped  at 
Kornwestheim,  near  Ludwigsburg ;  this  made  it  easier 
for  Schiller  to  visit  Marbach.  Meanwhile  he  had  been 
transferred  to  another  regiment  —  to  that  commanded 
by  General  Romann.  On  July  9th,  the  duke,  who, 
shortly  before,  by  his  brutal  treatment  of  States-Consul 
Moser,  had  given  terrible  proof  of  his  abuse  of  justice, 
led  the  first  brigade  from  the  encampments,  which  fell 
in  with  the  French,  under  Soubise,  near  Cassel.  After 
General  von  Oberg's  defeat  at  Lutternberg,  on  October 
10th,  the  troops  went  into  quarters    for   the   winter. 


12  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Schiller  accompanied  the  stall  to  Winnenden,  and 
from  this  town  he  frequently  came  over  to  Marbach. 
The  country  hoped  —  but  in  vain  —  now,  at  last,  to  be 
freed  from  the  burden  of  taxation  for  fresh  levies. 
Though  the  treaty  with  France  had  come  to  nothing, 
the  duke  nevertheless  doubled  the  number  of  his  forces, 
believing  that  a  day  was  not  far  distant  when  they 
would  be  wanted  in  the  field.  And,  after  the  battle 
of  Minden,  on  August  1st,  this  actually  was  the  case. 
The  troops,  on  the  20th,  encamped  at  Ludwigsburg, 
whither  Schiller's  wife  and  child  came  now  and  again. 
The  duke  had  reserved  for  himself  the  supreme 
command  of  those  twelve  thousand  men,  who  were  to 
be  led  into  the  Fulda  district.  His  troops  left  camp 
on  October  28th ;  among  their  ranks  was  Lieutenant 
Schiller,  heavy-hearted  yet  still  hopeful,  having  se- 
cured distinguished  godfathers  for  the  son  that  would 
soon  be  his.  One  of  them  was  the  commander  of  his 
regiment,  and  a  chamberlain  as  well.  Colonel  Christoph 
Friedrich  von  der  Gabelentz.  Learning  likewise  found 
its  representative  in  the  lieutenant's  cousin,  Johann 
Friedrich  Schiller,  with  whom  during  that  year  he  had 
first  become  acquainted.  This  cousin  was  born  on 
July  15,  1731,  at  Marbach,  being  the  son  of  Johann 
Caspar  Schiller,  a  baker,  who  had  come  from  Waiblin- 
gen,  where  his  father  Johann  Georg  —  probably  the 
lieutenant's  uncle  —  had  followed  the  same  trade. 
Johann  Friedrich  had  with  liis  parents  been  early 
removed  to  Steinheim  on  the  Murr.  Despite  his  eight 
and  twenty  years,  he  at  the  time  professed  to  be  study- 
ing philosophy  at  Halle.  He  also  busied  himself  much 
with  the  science  of  history  and  of  finance ;  moreover, 
he  had  won  the  duke's  confidence  to  such  an  extent 
as  to  be  employed  by  him  in  a  diplomatic  capacity.. 
The  duke,  so  it  seems,  had  to  furnish  troops  for  Hol- 
land's Indian  possessions,  as  we  find  this  same  philoso- 
phicG  studiosus  writing  to  a  friend  in  Halle  that  since 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  13 

the  autumn  vacation  he  had  been  in  Holland,  whence 
he  had  been  sent  "  on  the  Duke's  affairs  to  Hessen, 
thence  to  Stuttgart,  and  then  back  again  to  Hessen, 
returning  a  second  time  to  Stuttgart  at  his  Grace's 
request."  He  adds  that  in  a  day  or  two  he  will  know 
whether  he  is  to  leave  that  place  or  to  remain  there. 
He  speaks  of  the  Duke  as  "  our  dearest  Karl,"  whose 
schemes  if  all  too  daring  were  still  upright  and  honour- 
able, and  so  far  those  of  a  man  who  had  succeeded 
without  the  help  of  cabals,  albeit  that  men  of  stand- 
ing had  felt  afraid  to  make  him  their  foe.  Lieutenant 
Schiller  set  great  store  by  this  cousin  of  his  in  the 
diplomatic  service,  with  whom  he,  too,  corresponded. 
Yet,  in  speaking  of  him,  we  are  losing  sight  of  the  son 
and  heir  whose  birth  is  soon  to  be.  Among  the  child's 
godparents  we  shall  find  the  Burgomaster  of  Marbach 
and  Vaihingen,  the  daughters  of  the  ex-Prefect  of 
Marbach,  with  those  of  the  warden  of  Vaihingen  —  a 
goodly  list  of  sponsors  to  figure  at  the  baptism  of 
a  lieutenant's  son. 

On  the  1 1th  of  November  the  duke  led  his  troops 
across  the  Main  in  order  to  join  the  French.  At 
early  morning  on  this  day,  or  on  the  one  before  it, 
great  good  fortune  came  to  Germany,  for  in  that 
ground-floor  room  at  Marbach  village  a  son  was  born 
to  the  lieutenant,  christened  Johann  after  his  father, 
and  Christoph  Friedrich  after  his  chief  sponsor.  The 
name  he  would  be  called  by  was  that  of  the  great 
king,  against  whom  his  father  with  the  duke  was  now 
about  to  fight.  Dating  from  the  summer  of  1755,  the 
parish  register  at  Marbach,  with  but  rare  exception, 
notifies  the  days  on  which  christenings  took  place. 
But  in  the  poet's  certificates  of  baptism  of  the  years 
1773  and  1792  (the  oldest  one  of  1769  states  the  day 
merely)  it  is  specially  remarked  that  the  child  had 
been  born  upon  the  same  day.  According  to  the  cer- 
tificates, November  11th  was  always  looked  upon  as 


14  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  poet's  day  of  birth.  Not  until  1787  do  we  find  it 
changed  to  the  10th,  which  date  Schiller,  on  coming 
to  Saxony  in  April,  1785,  must  have  stated  to  his 
friends  as  the  correct  one,  although  no  proof  exists  of 
his  having  in  the  meantime  learnt  aught  to  the  con- 
trary from  those  at  home.  Certainly,  in  his  "  Auto- 
biography "  of  May,  1789,  the  father  mentions  the 
10th ;  but  then  he  is  also  mistaken  as  to  the  birthday 
of  his  second  daughter  and  of  his  wife.  Louise,  the 
sister,  writing  a  letter  dated  November  11,  1796,  in 
her  mother's  presence  speaks  of  "  my  dear  brother's 
birthday."  Again,  on  the  other  hand,  we  shall  find 
the  poet's  eldest  sister  Christophine  with  her  husband 
celebrating  the  event  on  the  10th.  As  christening 
regularly  took  place  either  on  the  day  of  birth  or  on 
the  one  immediately  following,  there  is  always  the 
possibility  that  the  child  was  really  born  before  mid- 
night on  the  10th,  while  its  birth,  in  error,  was  regis- 
tered as  occurring  on  the  11th.  Schiller  himself,  when 
at  the  summit  of  his  fame,  was  wont  to  celebrate 
Luther's  birthday  as  being  also  that  of  his  own ;  and, 
considering  the  existing  uncertainty,  we  may  con- 
fidently follow  his  example.  Despite  the  father's 
absence,  and  although  the  chief  sponsors  were  not 
present,  the  babe's  christening  was  yet  a  notable  one. 
Fritz  was,  moreover,  additionally  honoured  when,  later 
on,  the  great  and  powerful  Colonel  llieger  announced 
his  wish  to  stand  godfather  to  the  boy.  When  the 
birth-news  readied  Lieutenant  Schiller  amid  the  ranks, 
he  besought  God  to  bestow  upon  his  son  "  those  gifts 
of  mind  and  soul  to  which  he  himself  through  lack  of 
education  had  never  attained."  This  he  did  with  firm 
trust  in  God's  goodness,  who  "  had  suffered  him  to  rise 
from  low  and  needy  station  to  the  rank  of  officer,  who 
had  ever  given  him  food  in  abundance,  and  who  had 
saved  him  from  many  perils."  His  most  ardent  wish 
was  that,   as  herald   of  the  Protestant  faith,  his  son 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  15 

might  attain  to  that  which  was  denied  to  him  ;  yet, 
how  could  he  have  guessed  that,  by  paths,  Hke  his 
own,  toilsome,  perilous,  and  still  so  wholly  different, 
nay,  so  utterly  at  variance,  his  Fritz  should  reach  a 
higher,  a  sublimer  goal !  How  could  he  foresee  that 
his  son  was  to  become  gi-eat  Germany's  favourite  bard, 
an  enthusiastic  combatant  against  the  base  despotism 
that  crushed  him,  a  despotism  that,  partly  through 
need  of  a  livelihood,  and  partly,  may  be,  through  an 
innate  sense  of  conservatism,  he  himself  had  courted ! 


CHAPTEE   II. 

FKOM  1759  TO  1766. 

During  this  same  November  in  which  our  poet  was 
born,  the  duke  had  won  for  himself  no  laurels.  At 
early  morning  on  the  30th,  as  he  was  giving  a  ball  at 
Fulda,  the  Prince  of  Brunswick  attacked  him  unex- 
pectedly ;  and,  though  the  Wiirtembergers  made  a 
gallant  defence,  most  of  them,  after  a  protracted  strug- 
gle, were  driven  back  across  the  Fulda,  the  remaining 
companies  being  taken  prisoner.  Schiller  and  the 
duke  got  away  with  other  fugitives,  who,  by  devious 
routes,  found  union  behind  the  Rhone  mountains. 
Karl  Eugene,  who  was  not  remiss  in  publishing  vic- 
torious news,  quarrelled  with  the  other  generals  re- 
specting the  winter  quarters.  On  13th  of  January 
orders  were  given  to  occupy  those  in  the  Wiirzburg 
district,  but  so  disgraceful  was  the  conduct  of  the 
troops  as  even  to  provoke  complaint  from  the  French. 
So  it  came  that  discord  was  brought  about  at  the  very 
outset  of  the  campaign.  P)eing  loth  to  submit  to 
Broglie's  leadership,  the  duke,  on  May  15th,  withdrew 
his  troops ;  and  Schiller,  with  the  staff,  was  transferred 
to  Yaihingen,  wliich  is  close  to  Marbach.  Now  first 
could  his  heart  rejoice  at  the  sight  of  his  little  son, 
whose  deep  blue  eyes  looked  forth  upon  the  world ; 
yet  it  was  brief,  this  joy.  He  had  to  quit  Vaihingen 
on  the  20th,  feeling  more  keenly  than  ever  before  the 
anguish  of  parting,  of  being  compelled  to  leave  his 
wife  and  two  children  behind  in  increasingly  distress- 

i6 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  17 

ful  circumstances.     Fritz,  too,  was  a  weakly,  delicate 
infaut,  liable  to  convulsive  seizures  now  and  again. 

With  troops  and  baggage  the  duke  moved  leisurely 
and  at  ease  through  a  land  groaning  beneath  his 
cruel  oppression.  Wliile  on  the  march  to  Hohenstein, 
through  Meiningen,  Gotha,  and  Langensalza,  he  spent 
five  weeks  in  the  Harz,  until  compelled  by  the  imperial 
court  to  turn  thence  toward  the  rich  meadow-lands  of 
the  Saale.  The  Prussians  retreated  before  the  superior 
strength  of  the  aUied  armies ;  Torgau  and  Leipzig  were 
evacuated  ;  before  this  latter  city  Schiller  was  now 
stationed.  At  the  news  of  the  king's  approach  the 
duke,  who,  as  a  rule,  acted  merely  in  accordance  with 
his  own  wishes,  removed  to  Anhalt ;  thither  his  brother, 
Friedrich  Eugene,  fighting  on  the  king's  side,  despatched 
Colonel  von  Kleist,  who,  at  Kothen,  on  October  25th, 
routed  a  section  of  the  Wiirtemberg  troops.  Hereupon 
the  duke  left  the  imperial  army  and  withdrew  through 
Thuringia  to  the  winter  quarters.  Schiller,  with  the 
staff,  was  now  transferred  to  Urach,  near  Eeutlingen. 
In  February,  1761,  by  moving  to  Cannstadt,  he  was 
first  brought  somewhat  nearer  to  his  home.  As  the 
French  would  have  no  further  deahngs  with  the  duke, 
who  had  proffered  them  a  force  ten  thousand  strong, 
he  was  obhged  to  forego  his  projected  sale  of  the  Wiir- 
temberg troops.  For  Schiller  this  was  no  slight  advan- 
tage, who  had  on  August  1 7th  received  his  captaincy, 
a  rank  equal  to  that  possessed  by  those  of  noble  birth. 
He  was  now  able  to  stay  near  his  children,  and  to 
exercise  some  influence  upon  their  education.  His 
leisure  he  devoted  to  mathematics,  at  the  prompting  of 
his  cousin,  the  student.  The  family  took  other  and 
more  commodious  apartments  in  a  house  now  occu- 
pied by  Aufrecht,  the  baker,  No.  192.  In  1762  Cap- 
tain Schiller  came  still  nearer  home ;  his  regiment 
moved  to  Ludwigsburg,  and  thence,  for  a  time,  to 
Stuttgart,  being  at  length  permanently   quartered    at 


i8  THE  LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

Ludwigsburg.  To  this  town,  therefore,  he  brought  his 
family.  Now  first  could  the  parent,  with  his  deep 
sense  of  duty,  have  influence  upon  the  early  character 
of  his  child,  whose  talents  gladdened  him  the  more, 
the  greater  his  hopes  grew  respecting  this  long  wished- 
for  son. 

The  father's  main  characteristics  were  a  strict  ear- 
nestness, an  undaunted  perseverance  that  for  ever  keeps 
its  goal  in  view,  a  strength,  an  inflexibility  of  will, 
pushed  to  the  verge  of  harshness,  righteous  honesty, 
great  desire  for  action  and  for  self -improvement,  un- 
changing zeal  and  fidelity  in  the  service  of  his  master 
the  duke,  and  a  sincere  and  humble  trust  in  a  Being 
set  above  earthly  effort,  at  whose  hands  he  calmly  bore 
all  ills,  holding  them  as  those  trials  through  which  we 
must  pass  in  the  attainment  of  eternal  welfare.  The 
prayers  for  family  use  drawn  up  by  him  testify  to  his 
strict  piety,  prayers  that  are  plain  and  conventional 
withal.  Even  his  hymnal,  too,  the  so-called  "  Morning 
( )frering,"  of  which  he  each  day  read  a  portion,  is  in  no 
way  a  peculiar  one.  Pubhc  worship,  however,  was  so 
deeply  a  matter  of  the  heart  with  him  that  in  his  own 
house  family  prayer  was  made  a  special  and  a  perma- 
nent institution.  Fritz  inherited  his  father's  inde- 
fatigable energy,  thorough  earnestness,  and  ceaseless 
endurance,  his  integrity  and  dauntless  determination 
to  get  on  in  life ;  from  his  gentle,  sweet-tempered 
mother,  pattern  as  she  was  of  a  good  housewife,  he 
gained  his  thoughtful  temperament,  his  kindly  heart 
and  generous  warmth  of  feeling.  But  in  addition  to 
these  qualities  nature  had  endowed  him  with  the  germs 
of  a  keen  self-consciousness,  an  ardent  passion  for  free- 
dom, lofty  idealism  joined  to  great  depth  and  penetra- 
tion of  thought  —  gifts  which,  despite  the  opposing 
pressure  from  without,  reached  their  very  highest 
development.  Yet  for  him  it  was  great  fortune  that 
in  his  early   years  he  had  had   the  guidance  of  his 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  19 

mother's  love,  his  gentle,  tender,  pious,  patient  mother, 
who  brought  all  her  children  up  in  obedience,  in  virtue, 
and  in  the  fear  of  God.  So,  too,  he  gained  in  having 
an  elder  sister,  with  her  kindly  good  humour,  at  his 
side,  while  not  until  later  was  brought  to  bear  upon 
him  the  stern  influence  of  his  father,  whose  military- 
rigour  made  him  more  feared  than  loved.  Though 
as  faithful  vassal  of  the  duke  he  suffered  no  word 
of  blame  to  be  spoken  against  his  lord  and  leader, 
he  could  still  not  shut  out  his  family  from  a  knowledge 
of  the  country's  suffering  and  woe  ;  and  the  abominable 
treatment  of  the  once  powerful  Eieger,  his  son's  god- 
father, who,  untried,  unjudged,  suffered  barbarous 
imprisonment  at  Hohentwiel,  where  Moser,  by  a  like 
tyranny,  still  languished  —  this  utter  abuse  of  justice 
made  the  boy's  heart  throb  with  indignation.  Mont- 
martin  played  the  despot  in  a  land  wherein  the  States 
were  listened  to  no  longer,  while  the  duke  heeded 
nought  save  the  gratification  of  his  own  desires,  so 
that,  despite  all  oppression,  money  was  still  wanting. 
However,  a  sale  of  the  subjects  of  the  realm  would 
always  form  a  rich  source  of  revenue. 

At  Christmastide,  in  1763,  Captain  Schiller  was 
sent  on  conscription  duty  to  the  Catholic  town  of 
Gmiind  in  Suabia.  He  did  not  bring  his  family  until 
the  spring.  It  was  a  mournful  business,  this,  upon 
which  he  and  his  two  subalterns  were  now  engaged  ; 
the  duke,  being  anxious  to  have  it  done  thoroughly 
and  efficiently,  was  careful  to  make  use  of  all  those 
who  could  serve  him  well.  At  the  time  it  was  not 
known  that  these  levies  were  intended  for  Holland's 
Indian  colonies  ;  no  doubt  that  cousin  of  the  captain's, 
Fritz's  godfather,  had  had  the  arrangement  of  the  af- 
fair. SchiUer's  pay  was  to  be  three  gulden  daily  for 
board  and  lodging,  and  the  two  subalterns  hving  with 
him  were  each  to  receive  a  third  of  that  sum.  But,  in 
consequence  of  the  terrible  monetary  panic  then  pre- 


20  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

vailing,  nothing  was  paid  to  them.  Schiller  asked 
leave  to  transfer  his  quarters  from  Gmiind  to  Lorch, 
the  former  town  being  too  expensive  a  place  for  him. 
At  Lorch,  which  is  situated  on  the  Wurtemberg  frontier, 
Uved  Bailie  Scheinemaun,  an  old  friend  of  Schiller's, 
who  was  delighted  to  see  again  his  quondam  comrade 
iu  arms.  They  estabhshed  themselves  at  the  "  Sun  " 
tavern.  Beside  Scheinemaun,  in  the  two  clerics,  Moser 
and  Kapff,  the  rector  and  curate  of  the  parish,  Schiller 
fouud  firm  friends.  It  was  here,  at  Lorch,  that  his  son's 
mental  quahties  first  found  development.  For  the 
boy,  just  past  the  early  stage  of  childhood,  felt  the 
influence  of  nature  and  of  friendship  with  all  a  first 
keenness,  and  showed  strong  desire  for  the  learning 
and  understanding  of  things.  Here  he  could  watch  the 
Eems,  winding  its  way  past  gloomy  woods  of  oak  and 
pine.  On  a  hill  hard  by  stood  the  convent  with  its 
time-honoured  linden-tree,  its  ancient  Suabian  ruins, 
its  grand  old  portraits  of  the  Hohenstaufen,  its  sad 
mortuary  chapel.  Before  him  stood  Rechberg,  topped 
by  a  shattered  castle ;  from  the  meadows  around  there 
rose  majestically  the  Hohenstaufen  Kegel  or  cone, 
whose  relics  spoke  so  powerfully  to  him  of  Suabia's 
long  vanished  days  of  chivalry  and  song  —  sad  records, 
as  they  were,  of  the  ruin  of  a  noble  line  of  princes. 
Although  history  had  small  attraction  for  the  father, 
he  could  not  wholly  avoid  those  questions  touching 
bygone  history  put  to  him  by  his  son,  upon  whose 
imagination,  behke,  full  many  an  old  legend  and  folk- 
ballad  may  already  have  strangely  wrought.  Keen 
was  the  impression  made  on  his  religious  sense  by  the 
so-called  Mount  Calvary,  near  Gmiind,  with  its  chapel 
at  the  summit,  toward  which  twelve  stations  of  the 
cross  led  up,  where  Catholic  pilgrims  were  wont  to 
offer  prayer.  Family  worship  was  held  both  morning 
and  evening,  iu  which  the  boy  took  an  earnest  part ; 
on  each  occasion  portions  from  the  Bible  or  from  some 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  21 

devotional  work  were  read.  Attendance  at  church  on 
Sundays  was  strictly  enforced.  Fritz  did  not  only 
receive  religious  instruction  ;  Eector  Moser  also  taught 
him  together  with  his  own  son  the  rudiments  of  Latin. 
Even  Greek  was  to  be  commenced  by  this  clever  lad 
of  seven.  Joined  to  him  by  study  and  by  play,  Fritz 
grew  more  closely  linked  to  his  graver  comrade,  who 
formed  the  first  object  of  his  boyish  friendship.  The 
individuahty  of  the  worthy  Moser,  strict  though  he 
was,  so  deeply  stamped  itself  upon  his  memory  that, 
in  the  "  Eobbers  "  the  youth  has  paid  his  teacher  a  grace- 
ful and  a  lasting  tribute.  His  parents'  wish  that  he 
should  enter  the  Church,  in  which  Moser  filled  such  an 
honoured  place,  seemed  to  him  at  this  age  the  ideal 
of  all  possible  desires.  If  the  little  fellow  hked  play- 
ing at  being  clergyman,  dressing  up  in  cap  and  cloak, 
and  mounting  a  chair  as  pulpit,  this  was  but  a  child- 
ish pastime,  albeit  he  was  serious  enough  over  the 
matter,  running  off  indignantly  if  any  one  presumed 
to  laugh  at  him.  More  noteworthy,  however,  were 
his  great  love  of  truth  —  a  love  fostered  by  his  parents, 
and  which  led  him  to  make  voluntary  confession  to 
his  mother  of  all  his  wrong-doings  —  and  his  exceeding 
generosity,  a  quality  that  he  possessed  in  common  with 
his  sister,  and  to  which  his  father  was  forced  to  set 
bounds.  Captain  Schiller  had  been  meantime  trans- 
ferred to  the  Von  Stein  foot-regiment,  and  busied  him- 
self much  with  agricultural  matters  in  the  cause  of 
Wiirtemberg's  weal ;  of  these  things  the  boy  learned 
somewhat,  although  to  have  heard  some  of  his  parent's 
war  reminiscences  had  doubtless  been  more  to  his 
taste.  In  January,  1766,  a  daughter  was  added  to  the 
family,  named  Dorothea  after  her  mother,  and  Louise 
Catherine  after  one  of  her  sponsors.  As  godparents 
the  child  had  also  Eector  Moser,  the  wife  of  Kapff  the 
curate,  and  Frau  Ehrenmann.  Later  on,  the  boy 
formed   a  friendship  with  the  son  of   Deputy  Clerk 


22  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Conz,  his  junior  by  Dearly  three  years,  who  in  a  sub- 
sequent ode  addressed  to  Schiller  mentions  that  they 
had  already  at  that  time  enjoyed  much  of  nature's 
loveliness  together. 

Meanwhile,  with  Montmartin,  the  new  premier,  and 
his  gang,  the  duke  pursued  his  reckless  course.  Dur- 
ing the  spring  of  1764,  in  a  manner  quite  unheard  of 
and  totally  without  regard  to  the  States,  a  poll-tax 
after  the  Austrian  system  was  imposed.  "WTien  the 
representatives  of  Tubingen  made  complaint  to  the 
duke  of  this  injustice,  and  sought  to  lay  before  him 
the  utter  destitution  of  the  country,  he  angrily  ex- 
claimed, "  Bah  !  Fatherland,  Fatherland  —  /  am  the 
Fatherland  ! "  The  tax  was  enforced  at  the  sword's 
point,  and  Chief  Bailie  Huber  and  the  leading  burgesses 
of  Tiibingen  were,  by  their  opposition,  brought  to  the 
Hohenasperg.  At  length,  indeed,  the  voice  of  Freder- 
ick the  Great  prevailed  at  Vienna  ;  the  Council  of  State 
gave  orders  for  Moser's  release,  and  called  upon  the 
duke  to  make  his  peace  with  the  States  within 
two  months.  Moser  was  set  free,  and  the  duke  now 
treated  him  with  the  utmost  kindness,  he  having  been 
surrendered  by  the  States ;  toward  these  latter,  how- 
ever, Duke  Karl  still  showed  insolence ;  he  even  broke 
off  all  connection  with  the  ambassadors  who  sought  to 
remind  him  of  the  State  Council's  decree.  He  trans- 
ferred his  quarters  to  Ludwigsburg,  in  order  to  punish 
Stuttgart,  that  had  likewise  risen  in  opposition  to  the 
tax.  Yet,  despite  all  extortion,  despite  the  most 
shameless  sale  of  offices,  money  was  still  always  want- 
ing wherewith  to  pay  his  functionaries.  Among  these 
Captain  Schiller  was  also  a  sufferer,  not  only  receiving 
no  stipend  himself,  but  having  to  support  subalterns  as 
well,  thus  frittering  away  over  this  thankless  business 
the  slender  fortune  that  was  his.  In  despau'  he  turned 
to  the  duke  with  the  request  for  payment  of  the  two 
thousand  gulden  due  to  him ;  he  also  asked  for  leave 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  23 

to  resign.  Eegarding  the  former,  he  was  referred  to  the 
army  funds,  which,  however,  were  at  so  low  an  ebb 
that  nine  years  went  by  before  he  obtained  all  that  was 
due  to  him.  Nor  could  the  need  into  which  the  family 
thus  fell  long  remain  hidden  from  Fritz ;  he  must  have 
had  a  good  idea  of  how  the  country  was  being  gov- 
erned. After  three  years  his  father  received  permission 
to  resign,  who  accordingly,  at  Christmas,  1766,  rejoined 
his  regiment  then  stationed  at  Ludwigsburg. 


CHAPTER  III. 

FROM  1767  TO  1772. 

Captain  Schiller  took  up  his  dwelling  in  the  house 
of  Cotta  &  Co.,  the  publishers  and  printers ;  this 
brought  him  into  closer  connection  with  the  owner  of 
the  business,  Christoph  Friedrich  Cotta,  who  himself, 
under  Laudon,  had  likewise  trod  a  soldier's  path. 
Cotta  published  during  the  years  1767  to  1769  his 
anonymous  work,  issued  in  four  parts,  entitled  "  Reflec- 
tions on  Agricultural  Matters  in  the  Duchy  of  Wlirtem- 
burg,  by  an  Officer  in  the  Ducal  Service,"  a  work  that 
the  editor  twenty  years  later  stigmatises  as  extremely 
imperfect,  yet  which  was  nevertheless  well  received, 
partly  through  its  style,  and  partly  from  its  being  a 
strange  production  to  have  fallen  from  an  officer's  pen. 
Thus  the  publishing  house  through  which  Schiller  was 
to  reach  world-wide  fame  had  already  brought  out  his 
father's  writings.  Cotta  was  among  the  sponsors  of 
Maria  Charlotte,  the  daughter  born  on  December  21, 
1768,  together  with  a  Captain  von  Hoven  and  several 
friends  from  Lorch  and  Marbach.  It  was  no  small 
delight  to  the  father  to  have  a  large  plot  of  ground  at 
the  back  of  his  house,  wliich  with  quite  special  zeal  he 
converted  into  a  nursery  garden.  So  he  himself  tells 
us,  hitherto  he  dared  not  indulge  his  passion  for  agri- 
culture, without  in  a  way  lowering  his  position  as 
officer  in  the  eyes  of  a  certain  chque.  Now,  however, 
this  garden  of  his  gave  him  a  pursuit  which  none 
surely  could  condemn.     He  had  lil^ewise  special  cause 

24 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  25 

for  contentment  when  at  length,  in  the  September  of 
1770,  he  was  appointed  to  his  own  company. 

For  three  years  Fritz  attended  the  classical  school  at 
Ludwigsburg,  preparatory  to  entering  a  so-called  lower 
monastery  school  for  those  students  of  theology  only 
who  had  already  passed  a  threefold  examination  at  the 
Stuttgart  gymnasium.  In  this  school  he  got  to  know 
Captain  von  Hoven's  son,  Friedrich  William,  who  was 
also  intended  for  the  Church.  Fritz  grew  increasingly 
intimate  with  him,  particularly  as  they  both  lived  under 
one  roof.  The  fathers  were  ahke  anxious  that  their 
sons  should  devote  themselves  to  study  as  a  help  to 
future  fame.  Upon  this  they  both  set  great  count, 
Hoven  being  anxious  that  through  his  son  honour 
might  be  regained  for  his  family,  an  old  and  noble  one  ; 
while  Schiller  longed  for  Fritz's  brilliant  achievement 
of  what  through  domestic  trouble  had  been  denied  to 
him.  The  lad's  ambition  was  thus  fired  anew ;  in  this 
way  his  amour  jpropre  was  fostered,  heightened.  Al- 
though for  his  father's  sake  he  showed  great  dihgence, 
giving  to  his  masters  such  satisfaction  that  he  ranked 
beside  the  best  of  their  scholars,  his  strict,  unbending 
parent  was  still  of  opinion  that  he  did  not  work  suf- 
ficiently hard.  He  thought  the  merry,  reckless  boy 
was  too  much  given  to  play.  Hoven  tells  us  that  it 
was  Fritz  who  generally  gave  a  tone,  an  impetus  to  the 
ofttimes  boisterous  games  of  his  schoolfellows.  The 
younger  boys  were  afraid  of  him ;  the  elder  ones  re- 
spected him  for  his  pluck  and  fearlessness.  The  strict 
discipline  of  his  father,  who  sought  to  make  him  hardy 
and  well  used  to  self-denial,  aroused  his  powers  of  en- 
durance. Yet  it  must  have  saddened  the  boy  that  his 
parent  should  be  little  more  to  him  than  just  a  chill 
preceptor  of  morals.  For  this  he  found  amends  in  his 
mother's  deep  affection,  in  the  tender  love  of  Christo- 
phine  his  sister. 

Each  of  the  three  classes  had  one  master  only,  who 


26  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

was  called  preceptor.  Over  the  lowest  presided  a 
tutor,  who,  if  strict,  took  much  interest  in  such  of  his 
pupils  as  were  diligent.  Latin  was  the  sole  subject 
taught,  except  on  Fridays,  which  was  devoted  to  the 
study  of  the  mother-tongue.  Lessons,  lasting  in  the 
morning  four,  in  the  afternoon  three,  hours,  were  always 
prefaced  by  prayer ;  and  on  Sundays  the  scholars 
attended  church,  and  were  likewise  required  to  repeat 
their  catechism.  Fritz,  in  the  autumn  of  1768,  was 
removed  to  the  second  form  ;  and  here,  too,  Latin  was 
the  chief  subject  of  instruction  ;  translation  from  this 
tongue  into  literary  German  was,  however,  also  largely 
insisted  on.  On  these  Fridays  the  master,  a  man  of 
puritanical  notions,  suffered  only  the  reading  of  strictly 
evangelical  works,  and  the  repetition  of  psalms  and 
hymns ;  he  even  improved  the  occasion  by  catechising 
the  scholars  after  his  own  pedantic  fashion. 

We  still  possess  a  New  Year's  greeting  in  German 
verse  written  by  the  boy  for  his  father  in  1769.  The 
hymn-books,  containing  writings  by  Gellert  and  Uz, 
must  have  made  him  famiUar  with  rhyme  in  its  simple 
form.  To  show  his  skill  in  the  foreign  language,  he 
added  to  his  lines  a  translation  into  Latin  prose.  At 
Easter  he  passed  his  preliminary  examination,  winning 
the  assurance  that  he  was  a  lad  of  promise,  whom 
nothing  debarred  from  reaching  success.  He  accepted 
his  clerical  calling  as  a  matter  of  course,  being  igno- 
rant of  any  more  worthy  one,  albeit  he  could  find  scant 
spiritual  refreshment  in  the  arid,  soulless  formuke  by 
which  religious  instructors  then  sought  to  inculcate 
the  doctrines  of  Protestantism.  How  far  more  grate- 
ful to  him  was  the  gentle  fervour  with  which  his 
mother  would  bring  home  to  her  children  the  gospel 
lessons  and  the  stories  of  our  Saviour  and  his  dis- 
ciples !  We  have  good  proof  of  this  in  an  anecdote 
told  to  us  by  his  elder  sister.  At  Marbach  the 
grandparents  were  sunk  to  such  poverty  that  the  quon- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  27 

dam  timber-merchant  had  been  forced  to  accept  the 
post  of  gatekeeper  at  the  Niklasthor,  a  small  cottage 
being  granted  to  him  to  live  in.  Schiller's  mother 
failed  not  to  visit  her  parents  now  and  again,  taking 
the  children  with  her ;  and  Fritz,  at  these  visits,  could 
not  stay  his  feelings  of  compassion.  It  is  said,  too, 
that  he  was  ashamed  to  enter  the  humble  little  dwell- 
ing from  the  street ;  he  crept  in  at  the  back  door, 
across  a  ditch.  One  Easter  Monday,  as  toward  Mar- 
bach,  she  told  them  the  story  of  the  gospel  for  that 
day,  how  Jesus  appeared  to  his  disciples  at  Emmaus. 
So  vividly  did  she  put  it  before  the  children,  that 
with  tearful  eyes  they  knelt  down  upon  the  ground 
to  pray. 

Brought  up  hitherto  in  the  quiet  seclusion  of  Lorch, 
the  lad  must  have  been  singularly  impressed  with  the 
sparkle  and  movement  of  life  at  Ludwigsburg.  Jus- 
tinus  Kerner,  writing  of  his  own  young  days,  says : 

"  The  broad  streets,  the  alleys  of  chestnut-trees  and 
lindens,  were  filled  with  silken-coated  courtiers  wearing 
sword  and  periwig,  and  othcers  in  glittering  uniform. 
The  splendid  castle,  with  its  spacious  squares  and 
gardens,  the  adjacent  park,  whose  shady  groves  led 
down  in  many  Hues  toward  the  town,  the  broad 
market-place,  with  its  arcades  —  all  these  were  fre- 
quently the  scene  of  gaiety  and  merriment."  On 
a  lake  near  by  fetes  were  held,  and  fair  damsels  from 
Ludwigsburg  competed  for  the  honour  of  being  "  Lady 
of  the  Lake."  At  Shrovetide  a  Venetian  Carnival  was 
held,  at  which  all  —  even  children  —  had  to  appear 
masked.  Of  special  attraction  was  the  opera-house, 
built  within  the  castle  precincts,  the  largest  and 
handsomest  in  all  Germany,  its  boxes  and  walls  beset 
with  mirrors,  which,  when  lit  up  at  night,  had  a  most 
dazzling  effect.  The  elaborate  machinery,  the  gorgeous 
scenery  and  costumes,  the  distinguished  actors  and 
singers,  helped    to    heighten    its    grandeur   and    mag- 


28  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

nificence.  The  duke  made  it  a  point  that  the  officers 
with  their  families  should  regularly  attend  the  opera  ; 
so  that  Captain  Schiller,  although  well  aware  of  the 
ensnaring  effect  of  such  sights  upon  his  son,  who  was 
intended  for  the  Church,  could  yet,  hke  Hoven  his 
friend,  not  refrain  from  sometimes  taking  the  children 
there  as  a  treat.  Italian  opera  and  ballets,  it  is  true, 
were  all  that  were  performed  there,  so  that  the  boy 
understood  nothing  of  the  language ;  still,  the  scenery, 
the  dresses,  the  music,  and  the  acting  worked  power- 
fully upon  his  mind ;  he  was  all  eyes,  all  ears,  for  the 
stage.  In  this  way,  with  his  sister's  help,  he  was  led 
to  make  a  mimic  theatre  of  his  own,  where,  with  tiny 
cardboard  figures,  dramatic  performances  were  given  to 
an  audience  of  empty  chairs.  Schiller  himself  has 
confirmed  his  sister-in-law's  statement  that  he  used 
to  play  with  these  cardboard  figures  until  he  was 
fourteen,  when  he  left  Ludwigsburg.  If  his  sense 
for  the  stage  and  for  things  theatrical  was  less  keen 
than  Goethe's,  this  was  owing  to  his  stern  parent,  who 
put  a  rigid  check  upon  what  he  deemed  childish  waste 
of  time. 

At  Easter,  1770,  Fritz  passed  a  second  examination 
with  success ;  he  seemed  to  be  making  good  progress 
along  the  road  of  learning.  That  autumn  he  was 
transferred  to  the  first  class,  under  the  tutorship  of 
the  principal,  Johann  Friedrich  Jahn  —  a  sound  and 
thorough  philologist,  and  a  distinguished  scholar.  In 
this  form,  besides  Latin,  pupils  were  taught  both 
Hebrew  and  Greek.  Though  Jahn  was  in  orders,  he 
never  chose  to  fill  the  pulpit ;  he  devoted  himself  to 
the  study  of  those  languages  of  which  he  had  mastery, 
as  also  to  the  exposition  of  the  old  writers.  It  was  his 
method  of  teaching  and  his  regard  for  the  peculiarities 
of  his  scholars  that  enabled  him  to  bring  them  on 
further  in  their  studies  than  the  pupils  of  any  other 
classical   school  in  Wiirtemberg.     When   expounding 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  29 

the  Greek  and  Latin  authors  he  gave  to  his  hearers 
many  a  piece  of  geographical,  historical,  or  technical 
knowledge.  He  also  taught  them  Latin  verse-making ; 
and  for  this  Fritz  soon  showed  great  skill.  Hardly 
had  Fritz  passed  his  third  examination  when  Jahn 
accepted  a  professorship  at  the  newly  founded  military 
school  in  connection  with  the  ducal  residence.  Solitude 
Castle. 

On  February  27th  the  duke  had  at  last  established 
a  sort  of  amity  with  the  States ;  Montmartin  had  been 
dismissed  as  well,  although  continuing  to  stand  in 
high  favour  with  the  duke.  Shortly  before  he  had 
established  on  the  estate  of  his  chateau  "  Sohtude," 
some  few  miles  from  Ludwigsburg,  a  training-home  or 
institution  for  the  sons  of  gardeners  and  artisans,  under 
the  superintendence  of  a  Captain  Seeger,  son  of  a 
clergyman,  and  who,  before  entering  the  army,  had 
visited  the  monastery  school.  This  establishment, 
owing  to  the  pressure  of  famine,  was  that  same  year 
converted  into  a  mihtary  orphanage.  Yet  the  duke, 
dehghting  as  he  did  to  stand  in  close  relation  to  the 
youth  of  the  land  growing  up  beneath  his  eye,  rested 
not  until,  on  his  next  birthday,  the  11th  of  February, 
the  "Military  College  for  the  Sons  of  Officers"  had 
been  established,  with  three  classes  now,  where  before 
there  had  been  but  two.  Jahn  was  appointed  profes- 
sor there.  Besides  him,  Fritz  lost  his  friend  Hoven, 
who,  against  his  father's  wish,  was  obliged  to  enter  the 
Military  College.  Upon  those  officers  having  several 
sons  the  duke  made  it  incumbent  to  send  one  of  them 
to  this  institution.  To  avoid  displeasing  his  Grace, 
Captain  von  Hoven  resolved  to  give  in  his  youngest 
son's  name  as  a  candidate ;  but,  when  taking  him  to 
the  college,  he  incautiously  brought  his  eldest  son  also. 
When  Duke  Karl  heard  of  this  he  asked  to  see  the 
boy.  He  was  in  great  glee  at  the  lad's  answer 
to  the  question  as  to  whether  he  too  wished  to  enter 


30  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  college.  "  Oh,  yes,  very  much,  if  I  were  not  going 
to  be  a  clergyman  !  "  "  There,"  quoth  his  Grace,  "  the 
boy  has  distinctly  said  what  he  would  like ;  so  he  can 
stay  with  his  brother,  can  he  not  ? "  And  with  this 
speech  he  left  the  unfortunate  father  to  his  bewilder- 
ment, who,  after  long  consultation  with  Professor  Jahn, 
had  to  yield  to  the  duke's  will. 

Fritz  greeted  Winter,  the  new  head  master,  with 
Latin  distichs,  in  which  he  made  playful  allusion  to  the 
principal's  name,  by  expressing  the  hope  that,  for  him- 
self and  his  schoolfellows,  the  new  Winter  might  prove 
a  beauteous  spring.  Winter  was  a  good-natured  man, 
though  of  violent  temper ;  once,  under  misapprehension, 
he  was  led  to  requite  poor  Fritz's  lines  of  welcome  by 
thrashing  him  with  a  stick.  The  boy,  who  had  cer- 
tainly irritated  his  master  by  contradiction,  said  noth- 
ing of  the  matter  at  home,  fearing  his  father's  anger ; 
but  after  some  days  Winter  came  to  apologise  for 
having  beaten  his  son  without  cause.  That  autumn 
Fritz,  in  Latin  distichs,  expressed  to  Principal  Zilling 
the  thanks  of  the  school  for  holidays  granted  by  him. 
In  this  art  of  verse-writing  he  had  already  become 
wonderfully  skilful.  And  thus  early,  in  a  foreign 
tongue,  did  his  great  talent  for  form  and  style  undergo 
development.  Yet  in  other  work  besides  this,  his 
performance  ranked  as  first-rate.  Nevertheless,  on 
passing  his  second  examination  at  Easter,  he  was  in- 
formed that,  though  he  had  worked  well  and  profitably 
at  the  necessary  subjects,  he  must  be  pronounced  in- 
ferior in  general  knowledge  to  the  other  candidates  who 
stood  before  him  on  the  list.  This,  of  course,  his  father 
was  ill  able  to  brook.  According  to  Petersen,  who 
shared  his  friendship  later  on,  he  had  then  already  lost 
all  taste  for  boyish  sports  and  pastimes.  "  In  his 
leisure  time,  with  some  chosen  companion,  he  strolled 
about  the  enchanting  plantations  of  Ludwigsburg,  or 
wandered  at  will  in  the  delightful  country  surrounding 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  31 

the  town.  Laments  at  fate,  at  destiny,  speculations  as 
to  the  thickly  shrouded  future,  plans  for  his  later  life 
as  citizen,  these  were  his  favourite  and  his  usual 
topics  of  conversation."  Thus  early,  then,  had  he 
been  touched  by  a  sense  of  the  seriousness  of  life ; 
thus  early  did  he  have  foretaste  of  his  coming  sorrow. 

In  this  year,  too  —  in  1772 — we  have  to  record  his 
confirmation.  The  formal,  frigid  process  of  prepara- 
tion, before  renewing  his  baptismal  vows,  served  but 
to  chill  him.  When  upbraided  by  his  mother  for  his 
indifference  to  an  act  of  such  solemnity,  he  withdrew 
himself  in  silence,  starthng  his  parents  shortly  after- 
ward by  a  poem  in  German,  in  which  the  religious 
sentiments  within  him  found  utterance  in  all  their 
depth.  "  Fritz,  are  you  crazy  ? "  cried  his  father, 
wondering.  If  we  except  those  trifling  rhymes  for 
New  Year,  this  was  his  first  German  poem,  the  first 
in  which  he  summoned  the  forces  of  his  mind  to  give 
vivid  portraiture  of  his  feelings. 

It  was  in  this  autumn  that  Fritz,  after  successfully 
passing  his  further  examination,  was  to  enter  the  lower 
monastery  school  at  Blaubeuren ;  for  this  institution, 
alternately  with  that  of  Denkendorf,  was  wont  yearly 
to  admit  twenty  or  five  and  twenty  pupils,  of  whom 
the  guarantee  was  demanded  that  they  would  accept 
such  posts,  either  clerical  or  scholastic,  as  might  be 
offered  to  them.  But  Providence  had  already  mapped 
out  the  roads  along  which,  after  keen  trials,  he  was  to 
move  onward  toward  the  calling  that  was  his.  And 
even  had  he  held  on  to  this  monkish  life,  becowled 
and  buried  as  he  was  in  the  seclusion  of  a  convent 
school ;  even  had  he  pursued  the  path  of  a  Tiibingen 
theologian,  SchiUer  must  at  some  date  have  broken 
with  his  profession.  Yet  the  yoke  of  despotism  and 
the  consequent  struggle  with  external  misery  —  these 
were  still  needed  to  rouse  his  dramatic  powers  in  all 
their  depth  and  fire. 


Book    II. 

The   Duke's  Pupil 


CHAPTEE  I. 

FROM  1773  TO  1775. 

Ambition  gave  the  duke  no  rest ;  his  establishment 
was  now  to  have  many  departments  of  study.  "  Mih- 
tary  Academy,"  was  the  name  he  had  fixed  for  this 
now  enlarged  institution.  As  it  had  need  of  apt  and 
clever  students,  the  classical  schools  were  called  upon 
to  furnish  lists  of  their  best  and  most  promising 
scholars.  And  so  it  came  that  Captain  Schiller's  son 
was  mentioned  by  Winter,  who  acted,  probably,  upon 
a  hint  of  Jahn's.  The  father's  excuse  that  Fritz  was 
destined  for  the  Church  helped  as  little  as  in  the  case 
of  young  Hoven ;  against  the  duke's  will  his  faithful 
servant  had  not  the  right  to  raise  a  voice.  Fritz  now 
first  had  personal  knowledge  of  the  duke's  despotic 
arbitrariness ;  the  case  was  one  of  kidnapping,  though 
without  any  external  show  of  violence. 

On  January  16,  1773,  Captain  Schiller  brought  his 
son  to  Solitude  Castle.  He  was  just  turned  fourteen, 
this  red-haired  ex-theologian  standing  nigh  five  feet 
in  height,  dressed  simply  and  plainly  in  "  a  blue  jacket 
and  sleeveless  camisol,"  and  carrying  fifteen  Latin 
books  and  forty-three  kreuzers,  which  latter  he  had 
at  once  to  give  up.  Jahn,  his  former  tutor,  gave  Fritz, 
after  a  prehminary  examination,  the  credit  for  trans- 
lating the  "  Collectio  Autorum  Latinorum "  and  the 
Greek  New  Testament  with  fair  skill ;  he  also  declared 
him  to  be  well  grounded  in  Latin  verse,  though  his 
handwriting  was  none  of  the  best.     The  day  follow- 

35 


36  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

ing  he  was  formally  admitted,  after  the  list  of  rules 
had  been  read  out  to  him,  of  which  each  scholar  had 
to  have  a  copy.  The  number  allotted  to  him  was  four 
hundred  and  forty-seven.  In  this  "  Military  Acad- 
emy "  of  the  duke's  all  holidays  were  unknown ;  the 
pupils  might  never  visit  their  homes,  and  fathers 
could  never  see  their  sons  except  by  special  permission 
from  the  duke.  Such  interviews  always  took  place 
in  the  presence  of  an  attendant,  and  parents  could  only 
obtain  them  at  the  close  of  the  annual  examinations. 
All  letters  addressed  to  or  written  by  the  pupils  were 
invariably  read  through ;  if  anything  objectionable 
were  found  therein  they  were  withheld.  Thus  all 
free  speech  was  forbidden,  both  to  parent  and  to  child : 
home  letters  brimmed  over  with  eulogy  and  admira- 
tion for  the  duke ;  at  Solitude  this  was  the  strain  in 
which  all  joined ;  nay,  on  certain  occasions  such  hom- 
age was  enforced.  How  sad  must  all  this  have  been 
for  poor  little  Fritz,  torn  thus  cruelly  from  his  family, 
pressed  into  a  service  quite  new  and  strange  to  him, 
he  whose  joy  had  been  in  the  love  of  mother  and  of 
sister,  who  had  delighted  to  roam  at  will  through  the 
fair  fields  and  woods  that  circled  his  home. 

His  father's  severity  had  only  served  to  heighten 
his  love  for  hberty ;  now,  together  with  the  bitter 
prospect  of  total  isolation  from  his  home  was  joined 
the  irksomeness  of  rigid  military  discipline.  Those  of 
the  students  who  intended  to  enter  the  service  were 
arranged  in  two  sections  —  the  gentry  and  the  bour- 
geoisie ;  this  latter  class  was  again  divided  into  the 
sons  of  oflScers  and  those  children  whose  parents  paid 
less  (Honoratiorensohne).  Among  this  latter  class 
were  included  many  scholars  of  humble  birth.  The 
silver  shoulder-straps  of  the  "  gentry  "  or  Cavaliersohne 
were  not  their  sole  distinguishing  mark ;  they  were 
privileged  as  regarded  their  sleeping  apartments,  and 
dined    in    common    at    a   horseshoe-shaped    table   set 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  37 

apart  for  them  in  the  upper  part  of  the  hall.  More 
exasperating  even  was  the  arrangement  by  which,  at 
the  annual  distribution  of  prizes,  the  "  Cavaliersohne  " 
were  suffered  to  kiss  the  duke's  hand,  while  the  rest 
might  only  salute  the  hem  of  his  coat  in  a  hke  way. 

The  scholars,  all  of  them,  wore  a  mihtary  uniform. 
This  consisted  of  a  short  light  blue  cloth  coat  with 
black  facings,  silver  buttons,  and  white  shoulder-straps, 
a  waistcoat  and  hose  of  white  cloth,  and  a  three- 
cornered  hat  bound  with  white  cord.  To  this  was 
added  a  black  leathern  stock,  white  woollen  stockings, 
and  silver-buckled  shoes.  Boots  were  worn  only  in 
winter,  together  with  woollen  stockings  drawn  up  over 
the  breeches.  The  hair  was  cropped  from  the  centre 
of  the  head  and  curled  on  each  side  with  a  queue 
behind  ;  the  "  gentry  "  wore  theirs  powdered  ;  and  on 
high  days  and  holidays  they  had  a  more  elaborate 
coiffure.  Young  Schiller  must  have  felt  the  more 
uncomfortable  in  this  strange  costume  in  proportion  to 
the  want  of  skill  that  he  had  in  button-polishing  and 
wig-curling,  a  failure  that  often  brought  upon  him 
harsh  reproof. 

Then  how  narrow,  how  cramped,  how  dismally  mo- 
notonous was  the  whole  routine  of  the  college  !  Each 
dormitory  was  occupied  by  fifteen  scholars,  together 
with  an  officer  and  four  ushers.  Solitude  Castle  was 
a  building  oval  in  the  centre  and  flanked  by  two  wings 
and  circled  by  an  arcade ;  above  were  galleries  up  to 
which  two  splendid  staircases  led.  On  each  side  six 
little  houses  adjoined  the  main  structure  in  which  the 
masters  and  officials  lived.  Behind  the  castle  in 
crescent  shape  stood  twenty  buildiugs ;  among  these 
were  the  ducal  residence,  his  theatre  and  chapel.  The 
so-called  "  Hall  of  Laurels,"  of  which  use  was  made  on 
festive  occasions,  was  also  a  separate  building.  At 
the  rear  of  all  these  houses  was  a  garden  of  some 
nine   acres.     After   awhile,  a   section   of  the   scholars 


38  THE  LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

was  transferred  to  another  building,  at  the  back  of 
which  was  an  extensive  garden,  where  each  pupil  had 
a  small  space  of  ground  allotted  to  him  for  cultivation. 
Here,  in  this  house,  was  the  dormitory  of  the  first 
division  of  the  pupils,  to  which  Fritz  belonged.  The 
beds  were  ranged  in  order  round  the  walls,  and  by 
each  bed  stood  a  little  stool  and  table,  above  which 
was  a  book-shelf.  The  hour  of  rising  in  summer  was 
five,  in  winter,  six  o'clock ;  and  after  washing  and 
dressing,  the  pupils  marched  in  pairs,  according  to 
height,  to  the  diniug-hall,  where  they  breakfasted, 
after  grace  had  been  said  by  one  of  the  scholars. 
Thence  they  went  in  to  class,  where  lessons  lasted 
until  eleven.  Then  the  dormitories  were  revisited ; 
beds  were  made  and  uniforms  donned,  for  at  breakfast 
and  during  lesson-time  one  could  wear  what  clothes 
one  liked.  After  this  the  duke  himself  or  the  chief 
of  the  college  held  an  inspection  of  the  entire  scholars. 
Those  who  had  been  guilty  of  any  misdemeanour  had 
then  to  produce  the  so-called  note  or  ticket  wherewith 
in  each  case  the  master  had  furnished  them  ;  hereupon 
the  duke  or  his  deputy  administered  reproof  and  fixed 
punishment.  Then,  at  the  word  of  command,  the 
pupils  marched  to  the  large  hall,  where  they  dined. 
His  august  Majesty  the  duke  was  generally  present 
during  the  meal,  talking  and  chatting  with  the  chief 
ofhcer  and  ushers;  sometimes,  too,  with  the  pupils, 
who  afterward  filed  past  him  on  their  way  to  the 
dormitory,  where  they  changed  into  their  clothes  of 
the  morning.  Only  those  stayed  behind  who  had  some 
punishment  to  undergo.  In  fine  weather,  they  were 
taken  out  in  twos  for  a  walk,  or  else  they  went  into 
the  garden,  where  each  boy  could  busy  himself  in 
cultivating  his  own  little  plot  of  ground.  Fritz  took 
no  delight  in  his  scrappy  piece.  In  bad  and  rainy 
weather  the  pupils  remained  in  the  building,  where 
gymnastics  and  drilling  offered  them  amusement.    Les- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  39 

sons  were  resumed  at  two  o'clock ;  they  lasted  imtil 
seven.  At  this  hour  uniform  had  again  to  be  put  on, 
and  a  repetition  of  the  formal  meal-parade  of  the  fore- 
noon took  place.  In  the  dormitories,  lit  by  three  lamps 
only,  the  scholars  were  obhged  at  once  to  go  to  bed, 
silence  being  strictly  enforced.  On  some  nights  the 
duke  himself  came  hither  and  paced  up  and  down  the 
room. 

And  to  this  monotonous  mihtary  life,  begetting  in 
many  a  disgust  for  all  discipline  —  to  this,  one  was 
obliged  to  submit,  simply  because  it  happened  to  be 
the  duke's  "  Military  Academy."  If  he  took  a  keen 
personal  interest  in  the  scholars,  if  he  posed  as  a 
loving  father  among  loving  sons,  he  was  yet  to  most 
but  a  hard  taskmaster,  not  averse  to  dispensing  grand 
ducal  boxes-on-the-ear  now  and  again ;  his  condescen- 
sion was  felt  to  be  condescension  and  nothing  more ; 
it  was  powerless  to  impress  noble  natures,  who  saw 
that  he  sought  merely  to  be  admired  and  revered 

At  times,  leaning  upon  his  arm,  there  appeared  the 
Baroness  Leutrum  zu  Hohenheim,  a  lady  of  high  grace 
and  charm.  She  was  tall  and  shapely,  of  dazzlingly 
fair  complexion,  with  luxuriant  blonde  tresses  and 
handsome  neck  and  arms  which  she  wore  bare,  show- 
ing her  taste  as  femme  de  mode  by  her  varied  and 
brilhant  toilets.  The  pupils  knew  well  enough, 
though,  in  what  unlawful  relation  Franciska  stood  to 
the  duke.  After  suffering  bitter  treatment  at  the 
hands  of  the  rich  yet  cross-grained  Baron  Leutrum, 
whom  at  the  age  of  sixteen  she  had  been  forced  to 
marry,  the  Duke  Karl  Eugene  told  her  of  his  love,  and 
by  his  declaration  drove  the  jealous  husband  to  yet 
grosser  violence,  which  caused  her  to  flee  from  his 
roof.  The  duke,  hearing  from  her  how  matters  stood, 
himself  took  steps  to  effect  her  divorce,  and  when  this 
had  been  legally  decreed,  Franciska  came  to  Solitude 
Castle  as  his  recognised  mistress.     It  is  true,  she  dis- 


40  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

tingiiished  herself  from  the  many  who  had  preceded 
her  by  conduct  in  every  way  more  worthy  of  respect ; 
she  had  also  a  good  influence  upon  the  duke ;  neverthe- 
less, his  lawful  wife  still  lived,  who  had  left  him  many 
years  before.  He  founded  for  Franciska  at  Solitude 
an  Ecole  des  Dames,  corresponding  in  arrangement  to 
his  own  academy ;  of  this  institution  she  was  the  lady 
superintendent.  Thus  the  duke  did  everything  possi- 
ble to  raise  her  position,  but  the  stain  of  her  unlawful 
relations  with  him  could  not  but  repel  such  as  were 
not  dazzled  by  outside  glitter,  even  though  many  were 
glad  at  her  presence  among  them.  Sunday  formed  a 
break  to  the  eternal  monotony,  when  the  pupils  at- 
tended church,  receiving  the  sacrament  every  three 
months.  On  this  day  they  had  to  occupy  themselves 
with  the  reading  of  pious  and  edifying  works ;  and,  if 
the  weather  allowed,  they  were  taken  out  walking  in 
the  evening.  It  is  true  that  from  the  heights  of  Soli- 
tude they  could  enjoy  a  most  magnificent  view  of  the 
many  hamlets  and  villages  round  about,  nor  was  there 
any  lack  of  charming  spots  within  easy  reach  ;  yet,  in 
looking  upon  the  vast  expanse  of  country,  the  boys 
were  but  reminded  of  how  dismally  they  were  shut 
out  from  the  world  ;  nor,  with  an  usher  ever  at  their 
elbow,  could  they  rightly  and  thoroughly  enjoy  God's 
air  and  the  beauty  of  fields  and  woods.  In  summer- 
time, on  some  days  in  the  week,  they  were  taken  to 
bathe.  They  were  not  stinted  in  the  matter  of  diet, 
yet  the  food  was  not  always  properly  cooked  or  pre- 
pared with  cleanliness ;  small  matter  for  wonder,  this, 
in  the  absence  of  a  good  kitchen  and  of  those  to  work 
in  it.  Breakfast  consisted  of  soup,  served  in  tureens 
holding  enough  for  six  boys ;  the  plates  were  of  earthen- 
ware, the  spoons  of  lead.  For  dinner  there  was  soup, 
beef,  and  vegetables,  and  twice  a  week  a  ragout  of 
game,  the  so-called  "  extra,"  much  loathed  by  all.  The 
first  and  second  divisions  were  served  with  half  a  pint 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  41 

of  wine,  and  at  the  close  of  dinner  each  boy  received 
a  piece  of  bread  to  be  eaten  during  the  afternoon. 
Soup  and  a  milk  pudding,  or  else  ragout  and  bread, 
formed  their  supper,  water  being  their  only  drink.  On 
this  fare  Schiller  did  not  thrive  ;  he  became  sickly, 
whereas  since  his  fourth  year  he  had  always  been 
sound  and  strong  in  health.  The  lack  of  proper  ex- 
ercise, the  unwonted  diet,  the  wearisome  monotony, 
the  chills  caught  from  bathing,  the  longing  for  home, 
all  worked  together  in  a  most  unfavourable  way.  The 
more  he  pined  for  a  mother's  and  a  sister's  love,  the 
closer  became  his  attachment  to  some  few  comrades. 
In  the  academy  he  found  his  friend  Wilhelm  von 
Hoven,  who  had  already  been  there  a  year  and  a  half, 
and  whose  younger  brother,  also  a  pupil,  was  dis- 
tinguished by  extreme  industry  and  talent.  At  this 
time,  too,  he  grew  intimate  with  George  Frederick 
Scharffenstein,  son  of  a  goldsmith  at  Mont-beillard,  to 
whom,  on  August  29,  1771,  together  with  twenty-two 
compatriots,  the  duke  had  given  admission.  Despite  his 
taste  for  art,  he  had  been  forced  to  follow  a  military 
calling.  Seemingly  it  was  their  utter  difference  in 
character  that  drew  Fritz  to  make  Scharffenstein  his 
friend,  who  but  slowly  responded  to  his  companion's 
advances,  and  who  in  behaviour  was  such  a  paragon 
as  always  to  gain  the  foremost  prize  for  conduct. 

Besides  the  advantage  of  daily  life  among  so  many 
comrades  of  different  character,  all  smarting  under  a 
like  yoke,  the  best  to  be  gained  from  this  academy 
was  the  tuition,  it  being  the  more  effective  from  the 
fact  that  the  duke  periodically  added  to  and  modified 
its  strength.  Thus,  to  the  subjects  with  which 
Schiller  was  already  familiar,  were  in  brief  time  added 
geography,  history,  mathematics,  and  French.  In 
Greek  he  stood  higher  than  most  of  the  others,  so 
that  at  the  end  of  the  year  he  took  the  first  prize, 
owing,  as  was  stated,  to  his  "  excellent  abilities "  in 


42  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

this  branch  of  study.  But  this  prize  was  the  sole  one 
that  he  gained  in  six  years,  although  annually  a  goodly 
proportion  of  rewards  was  distributed.  That  year 
Huven  took  three  prizes,  among  these  the  second  one 
for  Greek.  In  a  school  report,  dated  November  16, 
1773,  speaking  of  the  "  conduct  and  general  behaviour  " 
of  the  first  division,  Kittmeister  Faber  said :  "  Schiller 
has  abundance  of  good-will,  and  shows  great  desire  to 
learn ;  his  negligence  and  lack  of  alertness,  however, 
call  for  repeated  reproof.  He  is  sensible  of  his  faults, 
and  strives  to  correct  them."  A  certain  unconquerable 
disgust  for  study  had  crept  over  him,  a  disgust  which 
he  dared  not  display ;  in  addition  to  this,  he  was  ailing 
in  body.  Wliilst  on  the  sick  hst  he  gave  reins  to 
his  poetic  fancy.  His  father  asserts  the  "  Ode  to  the 
Suu  "  to  have  been  written  during  this  year,  a  poem 
that  appeared  later  on  in  an  amended  form.  Also 
"  The  Christians,"  a  drama,  composed,  so  his  parent 
tells  us,  at  the  age  of  thirteen,  may  at  this  time  have 
had  its  beginning.  We  can  but  surmise  that  a  de- 
scription of  the  heroic  self-sacrifice  of  the  first  pro- 
fessor of  the  Christian  faith  must  have  been  of  powerful 
attraction  to  the  young  poet.  On  December  15th  there 
came  to  the  academy  John  William  Petersen,  a  lad  of 
sixteen,  son  of  a  clergyman  at  Bergzabern.  Schiller's 
intimacy  with  him  soon  ripened  into  friendship. 
Petersen  had  special  leaning  to  literature  and  philo- 
sophical meditation.  Through  him  Fritz  first  made 
acquaintance  with  Gerstenberg's  "  Ugoline,"  a  work 
which,  despite  its  ghastliness,  has  won  by  its  power 
the  admiration  of  Lessing,  Herder,  and  Goethe.  Less 
close  was  the  friendship  existing  between  Schiller  and 
his  Ludwigsburg  acquaintance  Elwert,  who  entered 
the  college  some  two  months  later. 

In  1774  the  academy  was  enriched  by  a  legal  de- 
partment, to  which  Schiller,  witli  the  most  of  those 
who   had  taken  up  scientific  lines  of  study,  was  ac- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  43 

cordingly  transferred.  But  the  law  students  had  also 
to  occupy  themselves  with  the  general  sciences ;  only 
eight  hours  per  week  were  allotted  to  them  for  special 
study  :  three  for  common  law,  as  many  for  the  history 
of  law,  and  two  for  Roman  antiquities  —  a  subject 
begun  by  them  two  years  previously.  Neither  in  law 
nor  in  the  other  subjects  did  Schiller  show  any  pro- 
ficiency (in  Greek  alone  he  was  usually  fourth) :  he 
was  more  prone  to  indulge  in  poetic  reveries ;  and  for 
this  his  iU-health  may  stand  as  excuse.  Before  Jahn 
returned  to  Ludwigsburg  in  November,  he  categorised 
Schiller,  Von  Hoven,  and  two  others  as  "  second-rate 
geniuses ; "  excelling  only  in  languages,  but  failing  to 
make  any  great  progress  in  the  general  subjects,  wherein, 
with  the  exception  of  Hoven,  they  none  of  them  had 
had  previous  teaching ;  in  Schiller's  case,  too,  illness 
had  served  to  keep  him  back.  Praise  was  given  to 
their  industry  and  general  conduct.  Rittmeister  Faber's 
report  of  Schiller,  written  in  December,  runs  thus : 
"  He  has  grown  three  inches  of  late ;  is  devout  in  his 
religion,  dutiful  and  respectful  to  his  superiors ;  nor 
is  he  less  sociable  and  friendly  with  his  schoolfellows ; 
is  possessed  of  good  abihties ;  has  been  seven  times  on 
the  sick-list  —  the  last  time,  from  September  2d  to 
October  7th.  It  is  owing  to  these  repeated  illnesses 
that,  despite  all  his  dihgence  in  comparison  with 
others,  he  seems  to  stand  fairly  far  behind." 

Two  of  Schiller's  works  remain  to  us  which  were 
completed  in  this  year.  That  January  the  duke  had 
demanded  of  the  first  division  of  the  pupils  a  written 
reply  to  the  question  as  to  who  was  the  most  inferior 
among  them  all.  The  intention  was,  not  only  that 
such  an  one  should  confess  to  the  title,  but  also  that 
it  should  be  given  to  him  by  all  his  companions.  The 
majority  acquitted  themselves  of  this  most  disagreeable 
and  thankless  task  by  more  or  less  brief  answers  in 
French  or  in  Latin  prose ;  the  scholar  in  question  had 


44  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

to  write  himself  guilty  in  his  own  mother  tongue,  ask- 
ing at  the  same  time  for  pardon.  Schiller  chose  to 
express  himself  in  the  form  of  Latin  distichs.  If 
these  verses  show  strong  repugnance  to  the  practice  of 
informing  against  others,  in  the  Hatteriug  praise  given 
by  Schiller  to  the  duke's  gracious  care  and  benevolence 
we  can  plainly  detect  the  inevitable  tone  of  an  acad- 
emy student.  During  that  autumn  each  pupil  of  the 
first  division  had  to  write  a  statement  of  the  char- 
acteristics of  himself  and  of  his  companions,  making 
particular  mention  of  their  disposition  toward  God  and 
the  duke  —  of  their  contentment  with  their  position 
—  of  their  industry  and  cleanhness.  From  Schiller's 
fulfilment  of  this  strange  task  we  may  gain  a  glimpse 
of  the  boy's  mind  and  feehngs,  which  were  well  beyond 
his  years.  Despite  occasional  clumsiness,  his  verses 
show  a  noteworthy  sense  for  diction  and  for  form ; 
there  is  the  sweep,  the  glow  of  rhetoric  in  them  as 
well.  If  he  expresses  the  deepest  reverence  and 
admiration  for  the  "  sublime  "  prince,  the  source  and 
founder  of  all  their  happiness  and  well-being;  if  his 
epithets  are  strongly  stamped  by  youthful  exaggera- 
tion, it  was  from  his  father  that  he  got  this  manner 
of  speech  —  his  father,  throughout  whose  writings, 
whether  official  or  private,  there  reigned  that  tone  of 
ultra-loyalty,  of  hyper-devotion.  What  must  not  his 
feelings  have  been  when  writing  as  follows :  "  I  see 
before  me  the  father  of  my  parents,  whose  gracious- 
ness  and  bounty  I  can  never  repay.  And  as  I  look 
upon  him,  I  sigh.  This  prince,  who  has  set  my 
parents  in  a  position  to  do  me  good  —  this  prince, 
through  whom  God  is  minded  to  work  his  will  with 
me  —  this  father,  who  aims  at  my  happiness,  is,  and 
must  be,  far,  far  dearer  to  me  than  my  parents,  who 
wholly  depend  upon  his  grace,  his  favour."  It  is  by 
"  a  religious  standard,"  he  further  argues,  that  the  duke 
should  judge  of  him.     "  Often,"  says  he,  "  you  will  find 


THE  LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  45 

me  rash  and  often  thoughtless ;  yet  why  need  faults 
and  errors  cancel  that  which  has  been  built  up  by  a 
trust  in,  and  a  love  for,  God,  and  which  forms  the 
fundamental  law  of  a  naturally  sensitive  heart  ? " 
From  these  his  own  words  the  duke  might  judge 
whether  he  did  not  love,  honour,  adore  him.  Was 
there  any  need  to  declare  this  upon  oath  ?  Were  the 
duke  to  question  his  companions  about  him,  they 
would  answer  that  he  was  obstinate,  hot-tempered, 
and  impatient;  yet  his  uprightness,  his  honesty,  his 
good  heart  they  would  praise.  Further,  he  admits 
that  he  has  not  made  right  use  of  his  good  abiUties, 
and  that  this  causes  him  dissatisfaction ;  yet  in  some 
degree  his  ill-health  must  serve  as  an  excuse.  He 
would  own  to  a  fault  for  which  he  had  often  been 
blamed  —  that  of  a  neglect  of  personal  neatness ;  the 
pohshing  of  buttons,  buckles,  and  shoes,  the  cleaning 
of  clothes,  the  elaborate  hair-dressing  —  all  this  was 
alike  repugnant  to  him. 

As  Schiller  was  often  confined  to  the  sick-room,  he 
had  abundance  of  time  to  devote  to  reading  poetry  and 
to  the  forming  of  poetic  schemes.  Klopstock  stood 
first  among  the  poets  of  his  choice,  yet  he  was  very 
fond  of  Haller  and  of  Goetz;  in  Lessiug's  "  Emiha 
Galotti "  he  also  found  intense  delight.  At  this  time, 
too,  he  had  become  familiar  with  Shakespeare,  whose 
stupendous  power  amazed  him,  though  it  was  revolting 
to  his  sympathies  that  the  poet,  in  moments  of  the 
sublimest  pathos,  should  be  able  to  jest.  The  confi- 
dants of  his  muse  were  Petersen  and  Von  Hoven ; 
through  him  they  too  felt  drawn  to  poesy.  Like  his 
master  Klopstock,  Schiller  at  the  first  kept  to  Biblical 
subjects.  Later  on  he  himself  cites  "  Absalom  "  as  his 
first  drama;  and  before  this  he  had  essayed  to  pro- 
duce an  epic  poem  entitled  "  Moses."  Nor  was  there 
lack  of  lyrical  effusions  at  this  period. 

Already,  in  September,  at  the  duke's  request,  Schil- 


46  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

ler's  parents  had  signed  the  formula  which  obliged 
their  son  to  devote  himself  wholly  and  entirely  to  the 
service  of  the  ducal  house,  not  quitting  it  unless 
allowed  to  do  so.  Naturally  enough,  he  was  not  con- 
sulted in  the  matter ;  of  what  avail,  forsooth,  would 
his  dissent  have  been !  At  first  he  had  to  study  law, 
for  which  he  had  small  liking.  In  1775  nine  hours 
were  set  apart  for  this,  while  fifteen  more  in  the  week 
were  allotted  to  philosophy  and  rhetoric.  According 
to  the  periodical  reports,  Schiller's  progress  in  these 
subjects  was  but  middling ;  in  Latin,  however,  and  in 
Greek  he  stood  high.  And  if  it  was  only  in  subjects 
begun  at  Ludwigsburg  that  he  made  advance,  the 
cause,  among  others,  lay  in  the  fact  that  the  new 
ones  had  slight  attraction  for  him,  and  that  poetry  had 
seized  him  with  all  her  force.  Goethe's  "  Clavigo  "  and 
"  Werther"  —  these  filled  his  soul,  his  imagination,  which 
was  brooding  withal  upon  creations  of  its  own.  His 
friend  Hoven  drew  his  attention  to  a  magazine  article 
containing  the  story  of  an  unnatiiral  brother  —  a  tale 
that  seemed  well  fitted  for  dramatic  treatment.  Schil- 
ler at  once  seized  the  idea,  but  ere  long  another  and 
more  powerful  one  came  to  him  after  reading  an  account 
of  the  suicide  of  a  student  at  Nassau.  He  at  once  re- 
solved to  immortalise  this  new  Werther  in  a  drama,  and 
accordingly  he  wrote  his  "  Student  of  Nassau,"  which, 
however,  on  completion  did  not  content  him.  Later  on 
he  was  sorry  to  have  destroyed  the  play,  as  many  of 
the  situations  in  it,  conceived  and  worked  out  with  all 
the  fire  of  youth,  might  perhaps  in  later  years  have 
been  useful  to  him.  Doubtless,  he  also  produced  many 
lyrics  at  this  time,  flung  off  hastily,  in  competition 
with  his  poet  friends.  He  had  to  take  care,  indeed, 
that  the  books  he  read  and  the  verses  he  wrote  were 
not  discovered  when  the  ushers  and  masters  made 
their  periodical  visits  of  search  and  inspection  of  the 
private  belongings  of  each  pupil. 


CHAPTEE   II. 

FROM  1775  TO  1779. 

ScHiLLEK  had  just  reached  the  age  of  sixteen,  having 
been  three  years  at  the  academy,  when  it  was  trans- 
ferred to  Stuttgart.  For  long  past  the  drawbacks  of 
distance  from  the  capital,  as  also  the  need  of  sufhcient 
accommodation,  had  been  subjects  of  annoyance  to 
the  duke,  who,  however,  while  spending  all  upon 
the  Hohenheim  estate,  never  thought  of  adding  to  or 
of  enlarging  the  building  at  Solitude.  The  offer  made 
to  him  by  the  town  of  Stuttgart,  of  excellent  and 
capacious  premises,  in  every  way  fitted  for  his  acad- 
emy, was  therefore  a  highly  desirable  one.  Since  the 
court  had  left  Stuttgart,  the  new  barracks  at  the  back 
of  the  castle  had  remained  tenantless.  To  this  build- 
ing, on  the  18th  of  November,  the  cadets,  some  330 
in  number,  marched,  together  with  their  principals, 
masters,  and  ushers.  At  ten  o'clock  on  that  day  the 
duke  betook  himself  to  the  Hasenberg,  where  he  held 
a  parade  of  the  town  soldiery  ;  here,  too,  he  received 
the  pupils,  and  rode  into  Stuttgart  at  their  head,  amid 
universal  acclamation.  Outside  the  academy  he  was 
welcomed  by  the  scholars'  parents ;  within  it,  by  the 
masters  and  professors.  After  a  short  service,  he,  in 
person,  led  the  several  divisions  to  their  respective 
dormitories,  showing  to  each  boy  his  place  in  bedroom 
and  in  dining-hall.  Many  of  the  parents  were  present, 
and  Captain  Schiller  was,  doubtless,  among  their  num- 
ber.    He  had  left  the  service,  receiving  the  appoint- 

47 


48  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

meut  of  intendant  at  Castle  Solitude.  Tliither,  from 
his  own  well  -  stocked  and  well  -  tended  orchard,  he 
transplanted  some  four  thousand  apple  and  pear-trees ; 
as  a  recompense,  he  for  three  years  claimed  the  profit 
derived  from  all  the  adjacent  grass-land.  This  brought 
him  in  the  sum  of  a  thousand  gulden.  Owing  to  his 
most  careful  treatment  of  the  soil,  the  forest  school, 
that  hitherto  had  failed  to  thrive,  was  carried  by  him 
to  its  highest  point  of  excellence.  Meanwhile,  another 
daughter  had  been  born  to  him,  while  he  had  had  to 
mourn  the  loss  of  his  second  child.  Fritz,  alas !  could 
but  share  at  far  distance  in  both  these  family  events. 

The  final  examinations  were  held  in  the  new  build- 
ing; but  the  prizes  were  distributed  at  the  duke's 
chateau,  as  the  hall  intended  for  that  purpose  was  not 
yet  finished.  Their  removal  to  Stuttgart  gave  to  the 
pupils  not  only  healthier  rooms  to  live  in  and  better 
food  to  eat ;  it  brought  them  likewise  into  closer  con- 
tact with  the  Kfe  of  a  town.  In  particular,  they  found 
it  easier  to  smuggle  in  forbidden  articles,  especially 
tobacco.  As  a  consequence,  Schiller  began  to  take 
snuff ;  and  later  on  he  learnt  to  smoke.  There  was  a 
cadet,  who,  during  lessons  with  a  short-sighted  pro- 
fessor, was  most  adroit  in  escaping  from  class  by  the 
window,  and  in  fetching  tilings  for  the  others.  Schiller 
dubbed  him  "  The  Omnipotent." 

Six  faculties  were  now  formally  instituted  —  the 
legal,  the  philosophical,  the  military,  and  the  financial, 
together  with  a  department  for  the  fine  arts  and  an- 
other for  medicine.  As  one  was  rather  at  a  loss  to 
find  students  for  this  last-named  subject,  the  duke 
asked  which  of  his  pupils  had  a  mind  to  take  it  up  — 
Schiller,  Yon  Hoven,  Elwert,  and  six  others  gave  in 
their  names.  To  this  resolve  the  first  two  were  spe- 
cially helped  by  the  fact  that  they  were  backward  in 
their  present  branches  of  study.  New  and  nearer  rela- 
tion to  nature,  and  to  human  life,  would  serve,  so  they 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  49 

thought,  to  shape  aud  strengthen  their  poetic  tastes. 
The  duke  notably  approved  of  Schiller's  choice,  as  he 
seemed  to  him  to  have  special  aptness  for  the  science. 
Anatomy  was  zealously  studied,  and  lectures  in  medi- 
cine attended  with  great  diligence.  The  intimacy  be- 
tween the  poetry-loving  friends  grew  closer  than  before  ; 
each  enthusiastically  seeking  to  outrival  one  another 
in  original  composition,  and  in  the  choosing  of  fresh 
themes  for  poetic  treatment.  For  Schiller  Klinger's 
"  ZwiUinge  "  and  Leisewitz's  "  Juhus  von  Tarent  "  were 
of  powerful  interest.  In  his  enthusiasm  he  formed  the 
project  of  dramatising  the  grim  story  of  the  Grand 
Duke  Cosmo  de  Medici  and  his  two  sons,  Garsias  and 
John.  It  never  struck  him  that  this  was  in  effect  the 
basis  of  plays  by  Klinger  and  Leisewitz.  Hoven  medi- 
tated upon  a  novel  in  the  Werther  style;  Petersen 
was  busy  with  a  soul-stirring  tragedy ;  Scharff  en  stein, 
with  a  drama  of  chivalry.  But  lyrical  poetry  was  not 
wanting.  In  this  Klopstock  Vv^as  their  model ;  Biirger, 
Hcilty,  Miller,  Vosz,  and  the  Counts  Stolberg  won  also 
their  admiration.  Schiller  was  linked  to  Scharffen- 
stein  by  enthusiastic  friendship ;  this  had  been  specially 
fostered  by  the  courageous  way  in  which  Scharff enstein 
had  refuted  an  unjust  imputation  of  Intendant  von 
Seeger.  Schiller,  mightily  stirred  with  a  thirst  for  lib- 
erty, celebrated  Scharffenstein's  action  in  a  high-flown 
ode.  From  that  time  he  loved  his  friend  ardently,  pas- 
sionately, in  whom  he  had  found  his  other  self,  the  com- 
pletion of  his  identity.  Vows  of  eternal  amity  were 
exchanged,  and  besung  by  Schiller  in  many  a  line  of 
verse.  One  ballad  of  the  friendship  between  Selim 
and  Sangir  ended  thus : 


"  Sangir  loved  his  Selim  tenderly, 

As  thou  lovest  me,  dear  Scharffenstein  ; 
Selim  loved  his  Sangir  tenderly, 

Even  as  I  love  thee,  dear  Scharffenstein.' 


50  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

And  after  these  two  Eastern  friends  they  accordingly 
named  themselves. 

"  God    knows   it,  I    forgot    everything,    everything, 
when  with  you,"  writes  Schiller,    later    on.     "I    was 
proud  of  your  friendship,  not  because  by  it  I  felt  my- 
self set  higher  in  the  eyes  of    men,  but  in  the  eyes 
of  a    more    lofty  world,  toward    wliich    my  heart    so 
glowed,  that  beckoned  me,  as  it  were,  saying :  '  'Tis  he, 
he  alone  whom  thou  canst  love ! '     As  I  was  saying, 
in  your   presence    I    expanded,  yet    I    was    never    so 
humbled  as  when  my  eyes  were  on  you,  when  I  heard 
you  speak,  and  saw  how  you  felt  what  language  could 
not  utter ;  then  a  sense  of  my  unusual  littleness  came 
over  me ;  then  I  likewise  besought  God  to  make  me 
hke  you.     You  can  easily  recollect  how  in  this  fore- 
taste of  a  blissful  time    I  breathed  nought    else   but 
friendship ;  how  all,  all,  even  my  poetry,  was  lit  up  and 
\avified  by  the  spirit  of  friendship.     Oh !  a  friendship 
formed  as  ours  was  formed,  had  been  able  to  outlast 
eternity  !     Where  could  you  have  found  another  to  feel 
with  you  that  which  our  eyes  told  us  we  felt  on  quiet 
starlit  nights,  when  at  my  window  or  during  the  even- 
ing walk !     We  two  were  the  sole  ones  whose  charac- 
ters were  alike ;  believe    me,  in  our  friendship  there 
were  gHmpses  the  most  glorious  of  heaven ;  its  basis 
was  of  the  firmest,  the  noblest ;  it  foretold  for  botli  of 
us  but  one  paradise.     Had  you  or  had  I  died  ten  times 
over,  death   should   not  have  tricked   us  of  a  single 
hour.     I  chose  you  for  my  friend  because  you   have 
more  sagacity,  more  experience,  more  ballast  than  I ; 
because,  before  all  others,  you  have  come  wholly  close 
to  my  heart's  feelings,  and  have  equalled  them ;  be- 
cause, other  than  you,  I  have  no  friend !     This,  too,  I 
told  you  in  the  hour  when    first  our   friendship  had 
birth." 

With  Haug   Schiller    soon  became    more   intimate. 
Hang  was  a  friend  of  Schubart's,  to  whom,  for  the  Octo- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  51 

ber  number  of  his  magazine,  he  sent  Schiller's  poem 
"  Evening,"  a  pendant  to  Haller's  "  Morning  Thoughts." 
It  was  signed  with  the  letters  "  Sch."  Haug  spoke  of 
the  author  as  a  youth  of  sixteen,  who,  as  it  seemed  to 
him,  was  already  versed  in  the  writings  of  good  authors 
(poets,  of  course,  he  meant),  and  who  might  with  time 
possess  OS  'magna  sonaturum.  In  this  poem  the  in- 
fluence of  Klopstock  and  HaUer  is  but  too  plainly 
perceptible  ;  it  is  more  than  influence  ;  it  becomes  imi- 
tation. But  Schiller  had  not  yet  conquered  the  tech- 
nical difficulties  of  the  ode ;  faulty  rhymes  abound 
throughout ;  the  editor  notes  more  than  one  grammati- 
cal error  as  well.  The  young  bard  rejoices  at  the 
"  blissful  emotion "  known  only  to  the  lowly  born, 
being  of  small  worth  to  princes  and  the  great : 

"  O  God,  'tis  Nature  that  thou  gavest  me  ; 
Part  worlds  among  them  —  only,  Father,  yield  me  song." 

Quite  in  the  Klopstock  manner  is  his  ending,  with  the 
wish  that  in  the  great  hereafter  he  may  come  to  a 
clearer,  juster  judgment  of  things  : 

"  No  evening  there,  no  darkness,  no  obscurity  ; 
There  the  Lord  God  holds  reign  eternally." 

On  October  3d,  the  anniversary  of  the  Countess  Hohen- 
heim,  Schiller,  in  fulfilment  of  a  task  set  by  the  duke 
to  the  pupils,  presented  her  with  two  congratulatory 
addresses,  the  one  in  the  name  of  the  academy,  the 
other  in  that  of  the  Ecole  des  Demoiselles.  In  the  first 
of  these  he  makes  a  point  with  Franciska's  name-day, 
a  feast,  as  he  puts  it,  ordained  by  Nature  for  the  join- 
ing together  of  the  virtues  and  the  graces.  Her  he 
celebrates  as  Virtue  radiant  with  the  lustre  of  a  thou- 
sand righteous  deeds,  the  benefactress  of  the  sick  and 
needy.  In  the  other  poem  of  the  Ecole  des  Demoi- 
selles, Franciska  is  termed  the  gentlest,  worthiest,  best 


52  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

of  mothers,  a  "  very  pattern  for  youth,"  whom  to  imi- 
tate it  is  their  "  ardent "  desire.  The  sole  times  that 
the  cadets  met  this  EcoU  were  at  pubUc  theatricals 
and  dances,  which  both  schools  were  ordered  to  attend. 
For  Schiller  such  enforced  amusement  was  all  the  less 
amusing  from  his  being  a  bad  dancer ;  in  the  school 
reports  his  dancing  was  always  mentioned  as  being 
bad ;  once  only  is  it  styled  "  middling." 

Probably  it  was  for  the  duke's  next  birthday,  for 
the  11th  of  February,  1777,  that  Schiller  wrote  his 
little  play,  entitled  "  The  Fair,"  which  was  acted  by 
some  of  his  companions.  According  to  Petersen,  "it 
already  gave  evidence  of  the  genial  brain  that,  with 
the  magical  force  of  a  Proteus,  knew  how  to  transform 
itself  into  all  and  every  shape."  A  year  before  this 
the  duke  had  permitted  the  pupils  to  attend  the  Stutt- 
gart fair. 

The  friends  pursued  their  poetic  studies,  continued 
their  poetic  effusions  until  Scharffenstein,  less  gifted 
than  the  rest,  was  led  to  the  utterance  of  a  frank,  un- 
sparing criticism  of  Schiller's  work,  that,  while  leaving 
his  talent  unnoted,  touched  merely  upon  his  faults. 
His  poetry  was  stigmatised  as  hollow  and  fantastic,  as. 
imitation  in  its  crudest  form,  lacking  the  soul,  the 
core  that  alone  constituted  the  real  poet.  In  this  ver- 
dict Boigeol,  another  friend,  concurred.  Scharffenstein's 
unsparing  judgment  made  Schiller  so  unhappy  that  at 
length  he  would  have  nothing  more  to  say  to  him, 
Scharffenstein  taxed  his  friend  with  indifference  — 
charged  him  with  having  fallen  from  his  allegiance. 
We  still  possess  Schiller's  reply,  written  in  the  utmost 
agitation  during  the  early  part  of  1777.  Scharffen- 
stein's later  statement,  that  their  estrangement  took 
place  at  the  close  of  1778,  when  he  left  the  academy, 
is  contradicted  by  what  Schiller  says  in  a  later  letter 
to  Boigeol,  written  a  few  days  after :  "  Farewell !  I 
vdll  read  it  in  your  face —  will  not  question  you ;  let 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  53 

US  not  embitter  our  few  remaining  years  of  durance." 
Judging  from  the  context,  "  the  few  remaining  years 
of  durance"  can  but  be  those  spent  at  the  academy 
in  seclusion  from  the  world ;  Boigeol,  however,  was  to 
quit  the  college  at  the  end  of  1778. 

Listen  how  Schiller,  in  the  following  passionate 
letter,  that  ever  harks  back  to  the  same  point,  sets 
forth  his  feeliners : 

"  Why  am  I  gi-own  indifferent  ?  Because  I  loved 
you,  because  I  was  your  friend  and  saw  that  you  were 
not  mine ;  is  it  for  this  that  the  thought  has  seized 
you  ?  You  were  not  my  friend  !  You  must  have  had 
respect  for  me,  as  I  for  you ;  for  in  a  friend  there  are 
traits  that  make  you  respect  him ;  but,  but  —  may  it 
not  strike  your  heart  like  a  thunderbolt !  —  in  me  you 
found  nothing  to  value,  no  quahties  that  could  help  to 
cement  our  friendship.  In  me  you  found  nothing  to 
value  !  How  often  (yet  only  when  you  were  angered  : 
at  other  times  you  simulated  reverence,  admiration), 
how  often,  often  have  I  had  to  hear  from  you  and 
from  that  Boigeol,  that  my  whole  existence  was  just 
one  poem ;  my  sensibilities,  my  conceptions  of  God,  of 
rehgion,  of  friendship,  of  the  imagination,  according  to 
you,  sprang,  one  and  all,  from  the  poet,  not  from  the 
Christian,  not  from  the  friend.  Ah,  me  !  ah,  me  !  how 
my  heart  was  seized  by  all  that  you  said !  You  told 
me  this  —  God  knows  it,  and  is  witness  —  you  told 
me  this  with  deceit  written  upon  your  features,  with 
the  gravest,  the  most  earnest  mien  —  ah,  me  !  ah,  me  ! 
How  it  pains  me,  this  that  you,  you  did !  Do  you  still 
remember  how,  if  I  found  fault  with  some  book,  some 
poem,  or  the  hke  (Kleist's  '  Amynt,'  for  instance),  you 
used  to  say  that  it  certainly  wanted  swing,  it  lacked 
idyllic  charm ;  yet  it  contained  sentiment,  a  sentiment 
different  from  that  found  in  m?/  poems,  while  in  the 
workmanship  there  was  none  of  my  colouring ;  it  was 
heart  that  /  had,  or  words  to  that  effect." 


54  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

To  the  charge  that  in  his  odes  everything  was  trace- 
able to  Klopstock,  he  answered  that  he  had  certainly 
much  to  thank  him  for,  but  that  it  had  sunk  deep  into 
his  soul  —  had  become  his  own  property  ;  in  death  this 
would  serve  to  comfort  him. 

"  My  faults  caused  you  merriment,"  he  continues. 
"  You  knew  my  self-love.  Oh,  Heavenly  Father,  I  feel 
that  of  vices  this  is  one  of  the  most  odious ;  oh,  root  it 
from  my  heart.  Heavenly  Father,  I  confess  to  it,  I 
repent  me  of  it  —  and  you,  you  knew  my  self-love ; 
now,  before  God  let  me  say  it  to  you,  you  laughed  at, 
you  ridiculed  it ;  you,  my  friend,  put  me  to  shame  in 
others'  eyes,  you  who  in  secret  hid  it  from  me  and 
were  silent !  How  often  (yet  once  let  me  add  it),  how 
often  have  you  given  glowing  praise  to  my  poems  — 
how  often  have  you  raised  up  my  soul  to  heaven  — 
how  often,  when  we  sat  together  upon  my  bed,  have 
you  lent  ear  in  truly  marvellous  fashion  to  my  sense- 
less self-glorification,  saying  no  word  that  in  warmth 
might  have  escaped  you,  or  that  Boigeol  could  have 
whispered  to  you  ;  yet  you  never  chid  me  for  this. 
Do  you  still  recollect  how  we  were  once  standing  by 
Gegel's  bed,  and  how  you  asked  me  to  measure  my 
height  with  yours,  and  when  I  did  so,  with  a  wicked 
smile  you  showed  to  others  your  astonishment  by  say- 
ing :  '  He  waxes  both  in  body  and  in  mind,'  etc.,  and 
then  turning  to  me  you  said,  '  Clever  fellow ! '  Oh, 
saw  you  not,  too,  how  I  reddened  then  ?  Did  you 
note  nothing  else  ?  When  you  snubbed  me  thus, 
making  my  egotism  the  laughing-stock  of  all,  when  I 
stood  there  —  God,  what  feelings  were  mine  !  Heaven 
knows  it,  I  was  penitent  for  my  great  sin  of  self-love ; 
yet  such  scorn,  —  such  a  moment,  —  from  you,  —  in 
the  eyes  of  —  Oh  !  I  could  not  weep ;  I  had  to  turn 
aside ;  rather  destruction  than  another  such  instant 
from  you !  Oh  that  this  tear  may  not  fall  hot  upon 
your  soul !     Then,  too,  you  never  showed  pleasure  at 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  55 

the  thought  of  soon  seeing  me  nearer  to  you  in  school 
rank.  Forgive  me,  Scharfieustein,  if  in  this  moment  I 
prayed  God  to  gi-ant  me  the  very  opposite  of  that ; 
yes,  and  there  were  times  when  it  was  my  one,  my 
only  wish  to  advance  until  I  should  stand  near  to 
you." 

It  had  grieved  him,  too,  that  Scharffenstein  was 
become  intimate  with  one  Grub,  whom  he  could  not 
abide,  being  a  youth  of  bad,  petty  disposition.  At  the 
close  of  his  letter  he  remarks  that  after  long  unrest  he 
had  now  found  a  source  that  could  fill  his  heart  and 
bring  it  blessing  —  a  grand,  grand,  noble  friend ;  and 
for  this  reason  he  pardoned  him,  and  would  ever  show 
him  kindness ;  only,  for  many  a  day  he  must  turn 
aside  his  face  from  him  that  the  tears  be  hidden. 

"  See,  just  now  in  the  Bible  I  have  been  reading  the 
story  of  David's  life.  He  and  Jonathan  loved  each 
other  as  my  Selim  and  Saugir ;  in  heaven,  too,  I  shall 
be  loved  by  them,  because  I  love  them !  There  have 
been  noble  friends  in  the  world ;  and  I  —  I  sought 
myself  one  for  eternity  —  But  in  heaven  above,  there 
I  shall  find  hearts  that  are  noble  and  true ! " 

In  vain  did  Scharffenstein  attempt  to  convince  his 
friend,  wounded  as  he  was  to  the  quick,  that  the  whole 
matter  rested  on  a  misunderstanding  ;  for  Schiller,  any 
closer  friendship  was  impossible,  even  though  in  out- 
ward bearing  toward  him  he  remained  unchanged. 
And  Boigeol,  stung  by  Schiller's  frigid  reference  to 
him  in  his  letter  as  "  that  Boigeol,"  was  still  less 
successful  in  making  him  think  otherwise.  Not  till 
three  days  after  did  he  reply  to  his  charge  of  indif- 
ference, of  pride,  and  hate.  With  Boigeol  he  had  never 
been  on  so  intimate  a  footing,  and  his  mode  of  study, 
his  sensibihties  were  of  another  order ;  he  had  never 
trusted  him  frankly  and  nobly,  as  one  would  trust  a 
real  friend ;  nay,  Boigeol  had  injured  him  by  acts  that 
bring  torture  to  the  undying  soul. 


56  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

"  I  am  one  of  finer  stuff  than  most ;  it  was  seldom 
that  I  struck  the  right  mark  —  often,  often  I  missed 
doing  so,  as  latterly  in  this  instance ;  yet  here  —  here 
I  have  the  right  mark ;  God  will  be  with  me  and  will 
guide  me." 

In  lively  intercourse  with  other  friends  and  ac- 
quaintances, his  soul-felt  grief  soon  lost  its  first  poign- 
ancy. Among  these  were  Dannecker  the  sculptor, 
Heideloff  the  painter,  and  Zumsteeg  the  musician. 

In  the  meantime  Haug  had  inserted  Schiller's  ode 
"  The  Conqueror,"  signed  with  the  letters  "  Sch.,"  in  the 
March  number  of  his  magazine.  When  accepting  it, 
he  remarked  that  the  lines  were  by  a  youth  who  to  all 
appearance  read,  felt,  and  almost  thought  as  did  Klop- 
stock.  He  would  on  no  account  damp  his  ardour,  yet, 
when  rid  of  all  nonsense,  incoherence,  and  exaggerated 
metaphor,  he  might  some  day  rise  to  full  excellence  — 
might  with  time  take  a  place  among  the  great,  and 
bring  honour  to  his  country.  In  the  choice  of  subject 
alone,  yet  even  more  in  the  execution  of  the  poem, 
we  are  led  to  recognise  Klopstock's  influence.  Haug 
rightly  laid  his  finger  upon  its  blemishes.  Yet  despite 
exaggeration  and  want  of  finish,  it  plainly  shows  poetic 
strength  and  an  effort  to  work  in  accordance  with  a 
definite  theory.  But  besides  Klopstock,  there  were 
other  authors  from  whom  Schiller  received  powerful 
impressions.  He  read  Rousseau's  "  Nouvelle  Heloise  ; " 
he  wept  over  Miller's  "  Siegwart ; "  too  readily,  too 
easily  were  all  his  heart-strings  set  vibrating.  Both 
these  books  formed  his  favourite  reading;  he  had, 
besides,  Wieland's  "  Agathon,"  "  Idris,"  even  his  "  Comic 
Tales,"  together  with  other  volumes.  Ossian's  mist- 
creations  left,  likewise,  their  eflect  upon  liim  ;  and  a 
collection  by  Ursinus  of  "  Ballads  and  Songs  in  the 
Old  English  and  Old  Scotch  Style"  (1777)  was  nota- 
bly prized  by  the  friends. 

Scharffenstein's  place  was  ere  long  filled  by  Hang's 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  57 

son,  who,  at  the  close  of  1775,  had  gained  entry  to  the 
cn-cle  of  poets.  Born  epigrammatist  as  he  was,  he 
brought  to  it  life  and  spirit;  he  helped  greatly  to 
counterbalance  the  rhapsodical  element.  The  band  of 
bards  strove  with  each  other  in  the  composition  of  a 
truly  ethereal  poem  about  one  "  Kosaliud  at  the  Bath." 
Schiller's  ode  "  The  Triumph  Chant  of  Hell "  and  an- 
other poem  in  the  Klopstock  manner  were  likewise 
produced  at  this  time.  Schiller  also  grew  intimate 
with  the  son  of  Schubart  the  poet.  The  duke  having 
enticed  Schubart  to  Wiirtemberg,  forthwith  put  him 
under  arrest  without  trial,  without  justification.  On 
the  day  of  his  imprisonment,  about  which  Franciska 
was  quite  callous,  the  duke  granted  the  unfortunate 
wife  an  annuity  of  two  hundred  gulden,  admitting^her 
sou  into  the  academy  and  her  daughter  into  the  Ecole 
des  Demoiselles.  But  to  the  noble  dame's  petition  for 
the  release  of  her  husband  his  Grace  replied  that  she 
might  go  her  ways,  as  for  her  and  the  children  pro- 
vision had  been  made.  Here  again  all  the  young 
student's  noble  sense  of  hberty  must  have  been  roused 
at  the  duke's  cruel  revenge. 

Schiller  gave  less  attention  to  medicine  and  was 
more  diligent  in  the  study  of  philosophy  and  the  lib- 
eral sciences,  for  the  young  poet  divined  that,  to  gain 
perfection  in  his  art,  it  behooved  him  to  master  their 
laws,  while  from  history  and  from  the  works  of  great 
poets  and  sages  he  must  widen  his  knowledge  of 
human  nature.  He  became  deeply  absorbed  in  Fer- 
guson's "  Moral  Philosophy,"  with  Garve's  shrewd  anno- 
tations, besides  the  writings  of  Mendelssohn  and  other 
psychological  works.  Ferguson's  axiom  that  morality 
does  not  depend  upon  religion,  but  forms  part  of  the 
essence  of  humanity,  which  therein  alone  can  find  its 
end  and  solace  —  this  ever  took  firmer  root  in  his 
mind.  The  doctrine,  too,  that  man's  highest  aim  is 
self-distinction  worked  powerfully  upon  the  cadet,  put 


58  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

in  durance  by  grand  ducal  grace.  Ferguson  remained 
his  text-book  and  manual  of  philosophy,  just  as  Schlo- 
zer's  broadly  written  "  General  History  "  served  to  shape 
his  historical  views.  Plutarch's  "  Lives,"  bepraised  liy 
Rousseau,  gave  strength  to  his  sense  of  liberty  and  free- 
dom. Thus  it  grew  ever  less  tolerable  to  him  to  be 
shut  off  from  the  world ;  and  yet,  if  he  would  soon 
reach  that  world,  he  well  saw  that  he  must  apply  him- 
self to  his  studies  with  greater  zeal.  Five  years  was 
the  term  fixed  for  those  studying  medicine ;  by  special 
diligence  this  might  be  reduced  to  four ;  the  others, 
however,  were  far  in  advance  of  Schiller  and  Hoven. 
So  these  two  mutually  resolved  to  devote  themselves 
wholly  to  their  work,  in  order  that  at  the  end  of  four 
years  they  might  escape  from  their  academical  prison. 

Wilhelm  von  Wolzogen  now  became  one  of  Schiller's 
more  intimate  friends,  the  second  son  of  Privy  Coun- 
cillor Ernest  von  Wolzogen,  whose  death  occurred  in 
1774.  He  was  the  only  pupil  of  rank  —  i.e.  "cava- 
lier "  —  to  whom  Schiller  was  attached ;  Hoven,  on 
the  other  hand,  had  many  with  whom  he  was  on  terms 
of  close  friendship.  To  Wolzogen,  by  many  years  his 
junior,  Schiller's  relation  was  a  brotherly  one ;  he  be- 
came even  more  closely  drawn  by  the  remarkable 
talent,  particularly  for  philosophy,  possessed  by  an- 
other pupil,  one  Albrecht  Friedrich  Lempp,  who  came 
from  Stuttgart,  and  on  the  4th  of  April,  1778,  had 
joined  the  other  law  students. 

The  duke's  famous  manifesto,  issued  on  his  fiftieth 
birthday,  and  read  aloud  from  every  pulpit,  could  make 
but  Httle  impression  upon  Schiller,  however  much  Karl 
Eugene  might  pride  himself  upon  candid  confession  of 
regret  at  any  act  of  injustice,  while  promising  his 
"  faithful  and  beloved  "  subjects  to  devote  his  remain- 
ing years  of  life  to  their  real  welfare.  Yet  Schubart 
still  languished  in  confinement,  and  Schiller  yearned 
for  his  deliverance.      He   was  little   touched   by   the 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  59 

world-stirring  conflict  between  the  North  American 
colonies  and  England,  although  Schubart  had  sided 
vigorously  with  the  colonists,  had  denounced  the  base 
sale  of  German  subjects  to  England  by  their  own 
princes,  and  had,  moreover,  spread  the  report  that  the 
Duke  of  Wiirtemberg  had  in  this  manner  disposed  of 
three  thousand  men.  Whether  Schiller  ever  read 
Schubart's  "  German  Chronicle,"  aflame  with  the  love 
of  fatherland  and  freedom,  we  do  not  know.  Sick- 
ness having  broken  out  in  the  academy,  some  of  the 
elder  of  the  medical  students  were  appointed  to  wait 
upon  patients.  Naturally  enough  Schiller  here  gladly 
spoke  of  what  lay  at  his  heart ;  and  to  Heideloff,  who 
was  much  busied  with  theatrical  scene-painting,  he 
confided  his  close-cherished  dramatic  scheme. 

At  the  last  examination  Schiller  had  taken  no  prize, 
although  in  anatomy  he  ranked  in  equal  merit  with 
three  others.  The  lot  fell  to  Elwert ;  Hoven  also 
gained  two  prizes.  As,  however,  Schiller's  progress 
satisfied  his  superiors,  he  was  commissioned  to  prepare 
a  competition  essay  for  the  following  autumn,  which, 
if  successful,  would,  so  he  hoped,  secure  his  dismissal. 
The  subject  he  chose  was  one  dear  to  him  —  The 
Influence  of  the  Body  upon  the  Soul.  Nevertheless, 
neither  he  nor  his  comrades  were  suffered  to  leave  the 
academy  in  that  year ;  the  duke  decreed  that  they 
should  remain  there  for  another  twelve  months.  It 
was  soon  after  this  mandate  of  the  duke's  had  been 
issued  that  the  academy  was  honoured  by  a  visit  that, 
for  Schiller,  could  have  had  no  greater  fascination. 
He  had  certainly  felt  keen  pleasure  when,  on  April  7, 
1777,  the  Emperor  Joseph  came  to  see  the  college 
while  travelling  to  Paris,  assisting  at  the  prize  awards 
and  conversing  with  some  of  the  scholars.  It  was  the 
first  great  man  that  he  had  ever  seen ;  how,  then,  must 
it  have  rejoiced  his  heart  when  the  famed  author  of 
"  Werther,"   "  Clavigo,"   and   of  "  Goetz,"  in    company 


6o  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

with  the  Duke  of  Weimar,  visited  the  academy,  where 
they  received  high  honours  at  the  hauds  of  "  The 
Anoiuted,"  as  Karl  Eugene  loved  to  term  himself. 
They  appeared  in  the  dining-hall  one  evening,  where 
the  duke,  in  the  course  of  his  usual  post-examination 
speech,  made  allusion  to  the  distinguished  guests.  On 
the  follo^viug  night,  when  the  prizes  were  given  away 
in  the  salon,  his  Grace  stood  as  usual  under  a  gorgeous 
canopy  of  crimson  and  gold,  with  the  Duke  of  Weimar 
on  his  right  and  Goethe  on  his  left.  At  farther  dis- 
tance from  "  The  Anointed  "  were  four  other  guests  of 
higli  rank,  among  them,  Chamberlain  von  Wedel  and 
Wolfgang  Hexibert,  Reichsfreiherr  von  Dalberg,  direc- 
tor of  the  national  theatre  at  Mannheim,  he  who,  later, 
was  to  be  so  remarkably  connected  with  the  events  of 
Schiller's  later  life.  He  seemed  a  man  of  high  impor- 
tance to  the  young  poet,  full  of  keen  passion  for  the 
stage,  even  though  he  dared  not  dream  to  see  his 
"  Robbers "  put  upon  the  boards.  Schiller's  heart 
swelled  within  him  at  the  sight  of  Goethe,  the  fa- 
vourite of  the  Muses,  receiving  such  homage,  though 
it  was  not  for  his  poetic  fame  that  it  was  shown  to 
him,  for  Karl  was  far  from  having  either  acquaintance 
or  sympathy  with  poetry ;  it  was  because  Goethe  had 
risen  to  be  the  friend  and  confidant  of  his  prince.  The 
names  of  the  prize-winners  were  read  out  from  the 
chair,  and  each  pupil  advanced  in  turn  to  the  table 
before  the  duke,  on  which  were  the  sceptre  of  office 
and  a  row  of  silver  medals.  These  the  intendant 
handed  to  Ids  Grace,  who  as  rector  magnificentissimus 
bestowed  them  upon  the  fortunate  scholars,  whereupon 
those  of  rank  were  suffered  to  kiss  his  hand,  and  the 
rest  his  coat-hem  in  sign  of  thanks.  There,  at  that 
time,  Goethe  must  have  seen  a  tall,  red-haired  lad  of 
twenty,  well  set  up,  and  in  slovenly  dress,  pass  thrice 
near  him  to  kiss  "  The  Anointed's  "  coat  for  three  prizes 
gained  in  practical  medicine,  in  materia  medica,  and  in 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  6i 

surgery.  For  the  fourth,  the  "  German  language  and 
composition "  prize,  Schiller  had  to  draw  lots  with 
Elwert,  Hoven,  and  two  others ;  in  this  fortune  did 
not  favour  him.  There  was  nothing  extraordinary  in 
getting  three  prizes  ;  yet  during  the  past  five  years 
Schiller  had  not  received  even  one.  Goethe  himself 
saw  how  others  had  carried  off  five  or  six.  The  great 
man  could  not  foretell  that  tliis  pupil  would  rise  to  be 
a  gifted  poet  of  his  country ;  Schiller,  on  the  other 
hand,  must  have  drawn  deep  encouragement  and  inspi- 
ration on  seeing  the  man  whose  voice  had  rung  so 
stirringly  in  the  cause  of  liberty  and  the  pure  instincts 
of  humanity,  yet  who  had  thus  early  reached  so  high 
and  honoured  a  place  in  hfe. 


CHAPTER    III. 

FEOM  1779  TO  1780. 

With  fresh  zeal  our  poet  again  took  to  dramatic 
composition,  which  for  two  years  he  had  laid  aside. 
From  the  materials  of  an  unfinished  play  begun  at 
Solitude  he  now  produced  his  "  Robbers."  The  plan  of 
the  piece  was  rapidly  sketched  out ;  Karl,  his  hero, 
must  live  and  die  like  a  noble  robber.  Some  of  the 
scenes  most  interesting  to  him  he  worked  out  in  wild 
haste,  repeating  them  to  his  schoolfellows  at  evening 
time  or  when  out  for  a  walk.  Thus  in  Bopser  Wood 
he  is  once  said  to  have  treated  them  to  a  grim  recital 
of  the  famous  scene  between  Karl  and  his  father.  For 
some  of  his  portraits  he  was  indebted  to  fellow  pupils : 
Karl's  character  was  modelled  upon  liis  own  ;  while  the 
sketches  of  the  villains,  the  old  fatlier,  the  lover,  and 
others  came  from  plays  famihar  to  him,  figures  whose 
identity  he  had  seized  with  singular  acumen.  Often 
he  would  put  himself  on  the  sick-hst,  in  order  that  he 
might  the  better  court  his  muse ;  specially  at  night 
time,  when  his  imagination  was  most  \dvid,  he  could 
write  down  his  thoughts,  patients  being  allowed  a  light. 
If  ushers  or  even  the  duke  himself  surprised  him,  the 
paper  was  instantly  hidden  beneath  a  medical  book 
kept  ever  at  hand.  As  student  of  practical  medicine, 
he  had  often  to  visit  and  attend  upon  other  patients, 
and  on  these  occasions  many  a  scene  would  be  read 
out  or  declaimed.      Wliile  composing  or  reading  his 

62 


^^  zeal   our  p< 


Schiller  .reading  "  The.  koclyis" 

Photogravure  from  the  drawing  by  Junker 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  63 

poetry  he  was  always  at  a  high  level  of  excitement ; 
there  were  times  even  when  he  would  stamp  and  rage 
in  frenzy.  His  medical  duties  did  not  debar  him  from 
taking  an  interest  in  literature  and  in  the  general 
sciences.  During  this  year,  besides  Virgil,  with  the 
aid  of  Biirger's  translation,  he  read  Nast's  Homer ;  he 
also  attended  Abel's  philosophical  lectures.  He  pur- 
sued his  studies  relating  to  the  influence  of  the  body 
upon  the  soul ;  the  paramount  question  for  him  was 
that  of  man's  mental  and  spiritual  freedom,  he  feeling 
himself  to  be  in  such  thorough  thrall.  When  reading 
the  poets,  and  notably  the  dramatists,  he  took  accurate 
note  as  to  how  characters  were  developed  and  passions 
portrayed  ;  in  his  "  Robbers  "  this  proved  of  great  service 
to  him. 

Yet  despite  all  effort  to  render  bearable  his  dismal 
life  of  seclusion,  he  grew  ever  more  melancholy,  more 
disconsolate,  until  he  at  last  felt  utterly  weary  of  exist- 
ence. While  in  this  state  he  lost  his  friend  and  com- 
panion, Von  Hoven  the  younger,  whose  death  occurred 
on  June  13th.  During  the  last  two  years  he  had  de- 
veloped "  into  a  frank,  intelligent,  sensitive  youth,  such 
as  are  rarely  found."  In  his  letter  of  condolence  to 
the  bereaved  father,  Schiller  points  out  that  his  son 
had  left  the  world  all  soon,  bearing  none  of  its  stain, 
and  was  come  to  a  place  which  those  following  after 
would  reach  later  in  life,  when  more  heavily  burdened 
by  sin ;  for  him  there  had  been  nought  to  lose,  but 
everything  to  gain.  A  thousand  times  he  had  envied 
him  struggling  with  death,  that  he  himself  would  have 
met  as  peacefully,  as  calmly  as  were  he  going  to  his 
bed. 

"  I  am  not  yet  one  and  twenty,"  wrote  he,  "  but  I 
tell  you  frankly  that  for  me  the  world  has  no  further 
charm  ;  it  yields  me  no  gladness,  and  the  day  on  which 
I  leave  the  academy,  a  day  that,  but  few  years  ago, 
would  have  been  to  me  a  joyful  festival,  will  not  even 


64  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

win  from  me  a  smile.  With  each  step  that  I  advance 
in  age  I  ever  lose  something  of  my  contentment ;  the 
more  I  approach  riper  years,  the  more  I  would  that  I 
had  died  when  a  child.  If  my  life  were  my  own,  a  death 
such  as  your  beloved  son's  is  what  I  should  covet ;  yet 
it  belongs  to  my  mother  and  to  three  sisters  who,  with- 
out me,  were  helpless ;  for  I  am  an  only  son,  and  my 
father's  hair  begins  to  grow  gray." 

On  September  7, 1777,  Schiller's  family  was  increased 
by  the  advent  of  a  daughter,  who  had  Professor  Abel 
and  the  sisters  Elwert  as  godparents.  More  decided 
is  the  note  struck  later,  in  this  letter  to  his  sister 
Christophine :  "  Life  was  and  is  to  me  a  burden.  I 
long  for  it,  a  thousand  times  I  long  for  it  [i.  e.  to  die 
before  leaving  the  academy] :  I  find  no  longer  any 
pleasure  in  the  world ;  and  I  should  gain  all  if  I  could 
quit  it  before  the  time.  Pray,  sister,  if  this  should 
happen,  be  wise,  take  comfort,  and  console  my  parents. 
.  .  .  UnHke  a  thousand  others,  I  have  the  fortune, 
the  unmerited  fortune  of  possessing  the  best  of  fathers  ; 
and  here  there  is  another  excellent  man  to  call  me  son 
[this  was  Professor  Haug].  I  have  many  friends 
in  the  academy,  who  love  me  much.  I  have  you, 
dear  sister ;  and  yet  all  this  can  bring  no  lasting 
gladness  to  my  soul.  You  know  not  how  great  is  the 
change,  the  wreck  within  me.  Nor  indeed  shall  you 
ever  learn  what  it  is  that  saps  the  forces  of  my 
soul." 

In  this  one  is  reminded  of  Werther's  lament :  "  My 
heart  is  undermined  by  the  devouring  power  that  lies 
hidden  in  the  universe  of  Nature,"  Yet  this  was  not 
the  cause  of  Schiller's  unhappiness ;  it  was  the  dread 
reflection  that  throughout  his  life  he  must  be  the 
dependent  of  a  despotic  prince.  This  was  a  thought 
that  he  dared  not  reveal  to  his  parents.  One  can  see 
that  he  was  not  far  from  adopting  Werther's  melan- 
choly resolve  to  throw  aside  life's  burden ;  yet  now,  as 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  65 

often  after,  he  was  held  back  by  his  genius  from  the 
chasm's  brink. 

Two  days  before  the  death  of  Hoven,  with  altered 
voice  and  manner,  and  "  a  mien  of  fearful  calmness," 
Schiller's  friend  Grammont  had  come  to  him  to  ask 
him  for  a  sleeping-draught.  On  closer  questioning  he 
confessed  that  he  wished  to  quit  the  world,  in  which 
he  could  not  have  happiness.  As  already  before  this 
he  had  vainly  disputed  with  Grammont  upon  the  sub- 
ject of  suicide,  he  saw  no  better  way  to  arrest  matters 
than  by  counselling  his  friend  to  speak  first  to  Pro- 
fessor Abel,  and  in  the  meanwhile  to  go  to  the  sick- 
room, where  he  could  more  fully  state  his  reasons  to 
him.  Thus  things  were  delayed,  while  Schiller,  owing 
to  Von  Hoven's  death,  was  himself  seized  by  desperate 
weariness  and  disgust  of  life.  At  this  time  the  awful 
poem  "  Leichenphantasie  "  must  have  been  written,  in 
which  the  burial  and  notably  the  fearful  anguish  of 
the  father  following  the  bier  are  described  with  great 
license  and  intense  exaggeration.  It  was  set  to  music 
and  printed. 

On  the  20th  Professor  Abel  reported  Grammont's 
condition  to  the  duke,  who  gave  orders  to  use  every 
means  possible  for  the  restoration  of  the  patient,  whose 
state  "  bordered  slightly  on  insanity."  The  elder  medi- 
cal students  had  to  visit  him  in  turn,  reporting  the  state 
of  his  health  to  the  duke.  According  to  Schiller's  first 
"daily  bulletin"  of  the  26th,  the  patient,  by  dint  of 
persuasion  and  medical  advice,  was  so  calmed  about  his 
condition  that  he  consented  to  all  that  was  asked  of 
him.  The  duke  permitted  his  temporary  removal  to 
Hohenheim,  accompanied  by  one  or  more  of  his  fellow 
students.  His  Grace  suspected  Schiller  of  secretly 
encouraging  the  patient's  wish  to  leave  the  academy, 
where  for  him  recovery  was  impossible ;  it  was  natural 
that  he  should  think  this,  knowing  as  he  did  how  de- 
spairingly unhappy  was  the  poet's  own  state.     Gram- 


66  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

mont  after  a  short  time  came  back,  uncured.  Schiller 
was  appointed  his  companion  and  attendant,  yet  he  was 
seldom  left  alone  with  the  sick  man ;  it  was  plain  to 
him,  therefore,  that  they  feared  his  harmful  influence 
upon  the  patient.  His  pain  at  such  suspicion  he  ex- 
pressed to  the  duke,  besides  boldly  justifying  his  con- 
duct in  a  long  letter  addressed  to  the  intendant.  For 
nearly  eight  years,  he  said,  it  had  been  his  good  fortune 
to  live  in  the  academy,  during  which  time  none  had 
ever  had  cause  to  call  him  slanderer.  He  was  relieved 
of  liis  charge  in  August,  when  Grammont  went  to  the 
baths.  Schiller's  tccdium  vitce  having  somewhat  sub- 
sided, he  devoted  himself  anew,  heart  and  soul,  to  his 
"  Robbers ; "  he  hkewise  commenced  a  translation  of 
the  v^neid  into  Latin  hexameters.  Yet,  ere  long,  his 
medical  studies  claimed  all  his  attention. 

For  his  German  thesis  he  proposed  to  take  two  sub- 
jects from  the  provinces  of  philosophy  and  physiology 
respectively.  The  first  was  the  close  affinity  between 
man's  physical  and  mental  nature ;  the  second,  the 
freedom  and  the  ethics  of  humanity.  As  throughout 
the  year  his  whole  studies  had  centred  round  these 
subjects,  he  could  promise  to  speak  about  them  to  some 
purpose.  The  first  was  chosen  for  him,  one  at  which 
Schiller  had  worked  last  year.  His  second  theme  was 
too  purely  philosophical ;  it  was  feared  that  he  might 
put  forth  views  all  too  high-flown,  too  startling  respect- 
ing man's  moral  freedom.  In  medicine  he  had  to  fur- 
nish a  Latin  essay  upon  the  difference  existing  between 
two  kinds  of  fever. 

In  the  midst  of  such  work,  the  3d  of  October  came 
round,  Franciska's  name-day,  that  this  time  was  to  be 
celebrated  with  special  splendour.  For  the  duchess 
had  at  length  gone  to  her  rest,  and  Karl  Eugene  was 
able  to  offer  Franciska  his  hand,  albeit  his  wish  that 
their  religion  should  be  one  and  the  same  formed  an 
obstacle  that  for  the  Catholic  faith  was  hard  to  sur- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  67 

mount.  So  much  the  more  did  the  duke  shower  boun- 
ties upon  his  beloved  one,  so  much  the  greater  was  the 
brilliance  of  her  festival.  Several  of  the  students 
offered  their  congratulations,  and  one  of  them  delivered 
a  complimentary  address.  In  "  the  village  "  there  was 
great  stir  and  merrymaking ;  half  the  college  flocked 
thither.  The  students  had  to  distribute  gifts  to  the 
three  hundred  and  twenty  poor,  who  on  this  occasion 
received  food  and  alms.  Schubart,  however,  still 
languished  in  prison ;  neither  wife  nor  child  might 
see  him  or  write  to  him ;  for  him,  Franciska,  the  para- 
gon of  virtue,  the  benefactress  of  the  needy,  had  no 
pleading  word.  Schiller  loathed  all  this  hollow  parade 
of  charity  and  benevolence ;  he  was  sickened  by  the 
vanity,  the  sham  of  such  fulsome  rejoicing  and  praise- 
giving,  in  wliich  so  often  he  had  had  to  join.  How  he 
longed  for  the  day  that  should  set  him  free !  Most  of 
his  time  was  now  taken  up  in  preparing  for  his  medi- 
cal examination.  His  German  essay  followed  in  the 
main  the  same  Hues  as  the  one  of  last  year ;  the  neces- 
sary affinity  between  physical  and  mental  perceptions 
was,  however,  now  pointed  out  with  greater  clearness. 
As  he  stated  it,  the  soul  after  death  "  passed  on  to  other 
realms,  where  it  could  exercise  its  mental  energies,  and 
whence  it  could  gain  other  aspects  of  the  universe." 
In  conception  and  in  treatment  this  second  essay 
showed  far  more  of  freedom  and  of  calm,  albeit  that 
it  abounded  in  daring  metaphor  and  bold  assertion. 
There  were  many  extracts  from  the  poets,  in  especial 
from  Shakespeare,  besides  quotations  from  Addison's 
«  Cato,"  "  Goetz  von  Berhchingen,"  "  Ugolino,"  Haller, 
Virgil,  and  Ovid.  He  even  ventures  to  make  more  than 
one  reference  to  his  own  play  "  The  Robbers,"  that  he 
here  cites  as  (sic)  "  Life  of  Moor :  Tragedy  by  Krake." 
Garves's  annotated  edition  of  Ferguson  is  his  sole 
authority  in  philosophy;  from  Scholzer's  history  he 
also  quotes;  from  Herder,  nothing.     No  judgment  is 


68  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

passed  upon  the  physioguomy  theory,  although  he  con- 
demns Lavater's  extravagant  ideas.  On  November  16th 
the  examining  committee  ordered  the  essay  to  be 
printed,  even  though  there  were  points  of  objection 
in  it,  a  chief  fault  being  that  the  writer  so  frequently 
gave  rein  to  his  imagination.  Abel,  who,  as  professor 
of  philosophy,  had  to  state  his  verdict,  found  several 
passages  of  excellence  in  the  paper,  although  the  phi- 
losophy here  and  there  was  far  from  being  either  logical 
or  sound.  Subject  to  correction,  however,  the  essay 
seemed  to  him  worth  printing.  The  medical  portion 
was  also  in  many  respects  commendable ;  yet  that,  too, 
must  undergo  great  alteration  before  sending  to  press. 
The  duke  left  it  to  the  examiners  to  fix  whether  the 
essay  should  be  printed  or  not,  and  they  stated  that 
the  author  had  taken  but  scant  pains  with  its  compo- 
sition ;  it  would  consequently  need  almost  total  revision, 
a  process  occupying  some  considerable  time.  Schiller 
revised  his  manuscript,  altering  and  cancelling  passages 
throughout ;  he  also  added  a  dedication  to  the  duke,  in 
which  he  spoke  of  his  good  fortune  in  having  been 
educated  at  so  excellent  an  institution,  where,  more- 
over, he  had  enjoyed  personal  instruction  from  the 
prince  himself,  whose  greatness  lay  in  his  having  chosen 
to  be  as  a  master  among  his  pupils,  as  a  father  among 
his  sons.  The  essay,  together  with  eleven  others,  was 
printed  at  the  expense  of  the  academy  by  the  firm  of 
Gotta  in  Stuttgart.  At  examination-time,  Schiller  is 
said  to  have  raised  a  discussion  concerning  Professor 
Driick's  paper,  that  dealt  with  the  merits  and  demerits 
of  Homer  and  Virgil  as  judged  by  the  spirit  of  their 
epoch.  In  such  a  question,  Schiller  may  well  have 
taken  a  side.  He  cherished  deep  admiration  for  Vir- 
gil ;  he  had  himself  produced  a  spirited  rendering  of 
some  of  the  -^neid,  and  the  Schwahische  Magazin  had 
but  lately  printed  his  version  of  the  "  Storm  upon  the 
Tyrrhenian  Sea"  (^n.  i.  38-160),  that  led  the  editor 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  69 

to  term  it  "  the  essay  of  a  youth  of  decided  promise, 
giving  proof  of  spirit  and  of  great,  gi-eat  poetic  fire." 
Streicher  tells  us  that  "  the  inbent  knees,  the  eyes, 
blinking  rapidly  when  in  the  heat  of  debate,  the  fre- 
quent smile  while  speaking,  yet  specially  the  well- 
shaped  nose,  and  the  keen,  bold  eagle-glance,  shot 
forth  from  beneath  lofty  brows,"  made  a  lasting,  an 
ineffaceable  impression  upon  him.  Here  we  have  the 
picture  of  the  whole  man,  aUve,  and  speaking  under 
the  influence  of  emotion ;  Streicher  will  not  mar  it  for 
us  by  any  illusion  to  red  hair.  Schiller's  nose,  accord- 
ing to  Scharffenstein,  is  thin,  wliite,  and  bony,  shoot- 
ing out  at  a  sharp  angle,  and  hooked  like  the  beak  of 
a  parrot.  Schiller  used  himself  humourously  to  relate 
that  at  the  academy,  in  order  to  make  his  nose  one 
fitting  for  a  great  man,  he  tugged  constantly  at  it  when 
reading  or  wiiting,  and  that  this  gave  to  it  a  sharp 
downward  curve.  The  "  keen,  bold  eagle-glance  "  was 
owing  to  the  deep-set  position  of  his  eyes,  which  in 
moments  of  excitement  gleamed  again.  The  colour, 
Schraffenstein  tells  us,  was  dark  gray,  although  many 
assert  that  they  were  blue ;  his  sister-in-law  says  they 
were  half  blue,  half  hazel. 

Streicher  was  present  with  the  scholars  that  evening 
in  the  hall,  where  the  duke,  as  usual,  made  his  closing 
speech.  He  saw  here  how  his  Grace,  leaning  over 
Schiller's  chair,  spoke  with  him  at  length.  While 
talking  the  pupil  smiled,  and  his  eyes  kindled  just 
as  they  had  done  in  debate  with  the  professor.  One 
could  almost  believe  that  upon  these  candid  con- 
fessions to  the  duke  his  destiny  would  in  a  measure 
hang. 

With  the  evening  of  December  14th  the  festivities 
ended.  That  same  day  Schiller  was  released  as  army 
surgeon.  His  friends  also  obtained  their  dismissal ; 
Von  Hoven,  after  passing  a  final  examination,  was  to 
take   the  degree   of  medicus  practicus.     Schiller  had 


70  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

grown  much  while  at  the  academy ;  he  measured 
nearly  five  feet,  uine  inches.  His  features,  too,  had 
gained  a  more  intellectual  stamp.  Scharffenstein  states 
the  closely  meeting  eyes  and  the  mouth  to  have  been 
full  of  expression,  in  which  there  was  something  of 
pathos ;  the  thin  uuderlip  showed  great  energy,  the 
chin  was  determined,  the  cheeks  pale,  freckled,  and 
somewhat  hollow,  the  hair  bushy  and  dark  red  in  colour. 
When  in  repose  his  countenance,  intellectual  rather 
than  manly,  was  full  of  energy  and  meaning  ;  in  mo- 
ments of  emotion  it  seemed  aflame  with  passion ;  while 
his  voice,  as  little  under  control  as  were  his  features, 
grew  at  these  times  harsh  and  shrill.  His  head  was 
particularly  well  shaped ;  the  brow  being  considerably 
broader  than  Goethe's,  whose  forehead  was  a  more 
prominent  one.  To  complete  our  portrait  of  the  ex- 
student,  we  must  bethink  us  of  his  tall,  upright  figure, 
his  broad  chest  and  shoulders,  long  arms,  small  body, 
and  stiff,  ungraceful  bearing. 

Extraordinary,  indeed,  had  been  Schiller's  intellec- 
tual development  during  these  eight  years.  By  all  that 
he  had  read,  all  that  he  had  written,  all  that  he  had 
thought,  his  poetic  fire,  so  far  from  being  quenched, 
had  but  been  fanned  and  cherished. 

What  feelings  were  those  of  the  youthful  poet  when 
visiting,  as  was  usual,  the  duke's  castle  to  thank  his 
Grace  for  the  many  benefits  enjoyed  at  the  academy, 
and  to  kiss  his  august  hand  !  Of  a  truth  Schiller  had 
gained  a  thorough  education  —  a  training  that  the 
duke  gave  to  each  and  all  alike,  regardless  of  individ- 
ual talent  or  of  individual  need  ;  he  wished  but  to 
bring  up  for  himself  a  set  of  well-drilled  subjects,  con- 
tent to  revere  him  as  their  sovereign  lord,  content  to 
feel  themselves  dependent  upon  his  bounty.  Nor,  after 
these  eight  years,  was  Schiller's  term  of  bondage  over ; 
he  must  serve  his  time  as  regimental  surgeon,  must 
wear  perpetually   a   uniform  at   once   disfiguring  and 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  71 

detestable.  His  father  wrote  to  the  duke  asking  per- 
missiou  for  his  son  to  dress  in  mufti  when  exempt  from 
regimental  duty  "  in  the  hope  of  getting  either  a  town 
or  country  practice."  This  was  the  blunt  reply  :  "  Your 
son  is  to  wear  his  uniform." 


Book   III. 
Army  Surgeon  and  Poet 


y 


'() 


CHAPTEE  I. 

FROM  DECEMBEK,  1780,  TO  JANUARY,  1782. 

While  in  a  wholly  despairing  frame  of  mind,  it  was 
but  for  few  days  that  the  young  surgeon  could  visit 
his  family,  now  in  their  new  home  at  Solitude,  and 
enjoy  sight  of  those  from  whom  he  had  been  parted 
for  eight  years.  It  was  delightful  to  greet  again  his 
beloved  mother  and  sisters.  Of  these,  Christophine 
had  been  the  faithful  playmate  of  his  childhood ;  but 
the  other  two  were  unknown  to  him.  Everything  had 
been  got  ready  for  his  outfit,  besides  a  little  sum  of 
money  for  future  need ;  albeit  that  320  gulden  was  the 
limit  of  his  father's  income,  who  now  no  longer  drew 
support  from  the  sale  of  the  grass.  At  a  monthly 
salary  of  eighteen  gulden,  Schiller  was  appointed  sur- 
geon to  the  Aug^  regiment  of  grenadiers,  consisting  of 
some  240  time-expired  men,  who,  in  their  patched 
scarlet  uniforms  and  tall  busbies,  wandered  about  like 
so  many  meagre  scarecrows.  In  any  important  case 
he  could  consult  Doctor  Elwert,  who,  fortunately,  was 
on  friendly  terms  with  his  family.  He  had  to  visit 
the  hospital  daily,  appearing  also  regularly  at  parade. 
Scharffenstein  tells  us  the  impression  that  the  poet- 
surgeon  made  upon  him  when,  after  two  years,  the 
friends  met  again.  "  He  was  cramped  into  a  uniform 
of  the  old  Prussian  cut,  that  on  army  surgeons  had  an 
even  uglier,  stiffer  look ;  his  little  mihtary  hat  barely 
covered  his  crown,  behind  which  hung  a  long  queue, 
while  round  his  neck  was  screwed  a  horse-hair  stock 

75 


o 


76  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

several  sizes  too  small.  More  wondrous,  however,  was 
the  nether  part  of  him.  Owing  to  the  padding  of  his 
long,  white  gaiters,  his  legs  seemed  thicker  at  the  calf 
than  at  the  thigh.  Moving  stihiy  about  in  these  black- 
ing stained  gaiters,  with  knees  rigid  and  unbent,  he  re- 
minded one  irresistibly  of  a  stork." 

Lieutenant  Scharffenstein  longed  to  see  his  comrade 
once  more ;  immediately  after  parade  they  met  and  re- 
vived their  friendship.  Sangir  marvelled  to  find  how 
great  had  been  his  Selim's  intellectual  advance  since 
their  parting.  The  author  of  "  The  Robbers  "  —  now 
all  but  completed  —  was  no  longer  a  dreamy,  imagi- 
native youth ;  fresh  qualities  were  his,  of  clearness,  of 
judgment,  of  determination.  Scharffenstein,  as  he  him- 
self tells  us,  gave  in  to  the  lofty  superiority  of  the 
poet's  mind,  that  from  the  sources  of  history  and  phi- 
losophy had  drawn  its  lifelong  sustenance. 

Before  all  things  Schiller  sought  to  impress  this 
upon  his  friend  —  that  happiness  can  but  be  won  from 
within,  and  not  from  without  us.  With  his  "  Robbers," 
that  struck  a  note  of  combat  and  defiance  to  existing 
oppression,  he  hoped  to  shake  the  world  as  Rousseau 
had  shaken  it  with  "  Emile."  But  he  little  thought 
that  it  would  ever  be  played  upon  the  stage. 

He  found  another  school-friend  in  Petersen,  who  for 
a  year  past  had  filled  the  post  of  sub-librarian.  With 
him,  Scharffenstein,  his  old  master  Abel,  and  Hoven,  who 
occasionally  came  over  from  Ludwigsburg,  there  was 
busy  talk  and  much  planning  about  the  play,  many 
a  scene  being  altered  or  excised.  Yet,  ere  he  launched 
this  bomb  into  the  world,  it  was  by  a  touching  funeral 
ode  that  he  drew  the  eyes  of  the  town  upon  himself, 
the  much  ridiculed,  quaintly  clothed  army  surgeon. 
On  January  1 6th  his  friend  Weckerlin  died  —  a  youth 
of  twenty,  the  son  of  a  Stuttgart  chemist.  He  had  left 
the  academy  some  two  years  before  the  poet.  So  power- 
fully was  Schiller  moved  by  his  comrade's  death,  as  yet 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  77 

SO  young  and  so  full  of  life,  that  he  felt  urged  to  invoke 
the  general  sympathy  of  his  medical  companions  in 
a  poem  which  they  unanimously  resolved  to  print  at 
their  own  expense,  Von  Hoven  and  Doctor  Elwert 
secretly  contributing  to  the  cost.  By  this  burst  of 
passionate  feeling  Schiller  not  only  gave  keen  utterance 
to  all  his  bitter  and  despairing  views  touching  the 
worthlessness  and  the  vanity  of  existence;  it  bore 
a  tinge,  too,  of  his  disbelief  in  the  vulgar  conception  of 
heaven ;  while  above  it  towers  supreme  the  conviction 
that  true  love  can  alone  outlast  the  grave,  can  alone 
join  us  again  to  hearts  we  have  held  dear.  Despite  its 
extravagance,  the  poem  was  full  of  power.  Stuttgart, 
pietistic  Stuttgart,  must  have  been  deeply  scandalised 
by  such  scathing  allusions  as  these  to  "  the  mob's  para- 
dise," or  to  "roaring  Pharisees,  ripe  for  hell."  The 
author's  identity  was  soon  no  secret.  Writing  in 
February  to  a  friend  at  Ludwigsburg,  Schiller  says  he 
could  die  with  laugliing  at  the  result  of  his  poem. 
"  At  length  my  activity  would  seem  to  have  begun,  and 
a  wretched  little  thing  like  that  has  brought  me  more 
fame  among  my  neighbours  than  twenty  years  of 
practice.  Yet  it's  a  name  like  that  one  for  which  the 
temple  of  Ephesus  was  set  in  cinders.  May  God  have 
mercy  on  me  ! "  Thus  shght  was  his  care,  his  interest 
for  professional  advancement ;  he  gave  no  thought  to 
promotion,  nor  to  examination  that,  before  obtaining  a 
private  practice,  he  needs  must  undergo  ;  the  sole  medi- 
cal work  in  which  he  invested  was  an  "  Apothecary's 
Almanac,"  buying  at  the  same  time  a  copy  of  Plutarch's 
"  Lives,"  and  an  expensive  translation  of  Shakespeare. 
His  other  wants  in  literature  could  be  easily  satisfied 
from  the  vast  shelves  of  the  ducal  library,  to  which, 
through  his  friends  Petersen  and  Eeichenbach,  he  had 
access. 

During  January  he  took  Other  lodgings  in  a  street 
now  known  as  the  Eberhardtstrasse ;  his  sitting-room 


78  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

on  the  ground  floor  was  a  small  one ;  its  scanty  furni- 
ture consisted  but  of  a  table  and  two  benches.  Pro- 
fessor Haug,  who  lived  close  by,  owned  the  house,  and 
used  the  second  floor  as  a  lecture-room  ;  the  rest  was 
let  to  the  widow  of  a  Captain  Vischer.  Besides  Schiller, 
Lieutenant  Kapf,  another  fellow  cadet,  lodged  there 
also.  He  was  the  son  of  an  officer  at  Mindelheim, 
talented  enough,  if  all  too  boisterous  and  passionate  in 
temper.  Yet,  though  wild,  he  was  not  a  spendthrift, 
and  perhaps  it  was  economy  that  led  Schiller  to  make 
his  acquaintance.  His  landlady,  Louise  Dorothea 
Vischer,  a  httle,  fair,  blue-eyed  woman,  was,  so 
Scharffenstein  tells  us,  a  good-tempered  person,  who, 
although  without  either  beauty  or  intellect,  yet 
possessed  quahties  of  kindliness  and  charm.  Her 
character  was  generally  deemed  above  reproach  ;  the 
greater,  therefore,  was  the  surprise  when  four  years 
subsequently  she  eloped  with  a  Viennese  student  of 
rank,  a  mere  lad  of  nineteen,  who  for  a  year  past 
had  been  hving  in  the  town.  Doctor  Eeichenbach's 
house  was  among  those  at  which  Schiller  found  wel- 
come, where  Christophine's  bosom  friend,  Ludovike 
Reichenbach,  hved,  the  doctor's  niece,  devoted,  hke 
Schiller's  sister,  to  painting  and  art.  She  had,  how- 
ever, but  slight  hold  upon  the  poet's  wild,  tempestuous 
imagination.  In  order  to  increase  his  slender  income, 
as  also  to  find  employment,  however  humble,  Schiller, 
in  March,  undertook  the  anonymous  editorship  of  a 
journal  called  News  for  Pleasure  and  Profit,  issued  by 
one  Mantler,  a  printer.  In  its  pages  the  Emperor 
Joseph  and  Prussia's  great  king  were  held  up  to  praise 
and  honour ;  regarding  the  American  campaign,  its 
sympathies  were  with  those  then  fighting  for  their 
freedom  ;  its  "  Science  Column  "  contained  little  that  was 
new  or  out-of-the-way ;  here  and  there  a  chance  phrase 
pointed  to  the  profession  of  the  editor.  In  his  new 
capacity  Schiller  had  to  read  through  many  magazines 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  79 

and  daily  prints  wherefrom  he  took  his  news.  An  ode 
by  him  is  the  chief  thing  of  interest  that  the  paper 
ever  contained,  written  to  celebrate  the  duke's  home- 
coming, after  a  journey  made  with  Franciska  to 
Cassel,  Hanover,  Hamburg,  Liibeck,  Schwerin,  and 
Brunswick.  The  "  pure  silver  notes  of  glad  rejoicing  " 
were  so  forced,  so  shrill,  that  other  princes,  it  was 
feared,  might  take  umbrage  thereat.  Did  not  the  bard 
bid  all  Germany  glance  in  envy  at  Wiirtemberg's 
"  bhssful  abode "  ?  Did  he  not  invite  the  repubhcs 
(those  of  Hamburg  and  Liibeck)  cheerfully  to  bear  the 
yoke  of  such  a  ruler  ?  This  ode,  however,  was  just  a 
mere  poet's-corner  welcome  of  the  commonest  type  ; 
any  one  who  looked  a  httle  closer  might  readily  have 
seen  the  jest  it  cloaked. 

In  his  professional  practice  Schiller  had  recourse  to 
violent  remedies,  which  led  him  at  times  into  differ- 
ences with  Elwert,  who,  it  is  said,  was  obHged  to  forbid 
chemists  to  make  up  any  prescription  furnished  by  his 
subordinate  unless  it  had  previously  been  passed  by 
him.  Merry  were  the  days  of  freedom  now  spent  by 
Schiller  with  his  student-friends.  Kapf's  little  room 
and  his  own  bore  witness  to  their  gay  carousals,  when 
many  a  quip  and  many  a  jest  was  bandied  over  knack- 
wurste,  potato  salad,  and  beer,  wine  being  a  luxury 
rarely  enjoyed.  Sometimes  he  would  join  Eeichenbach 
and  Petersen  at  a  game  of  cards  in  the  parlour  of  the 
Eagle  Inn.  Here  are  some  immortal  lines  anent  one 
of  these  meetings : 

"  You're  a  fine  set  !  I  go  there,  and  find  no  Peter- 
sen and  no  Eeichenbach  !  Sacre  diable  !  What  about 
our  manille  to-day  ?  Deuce  take  you  all !  If  you 
want  me,  you'U  find  me  at  home.     Adieu ! 

"  Schiller." 

Besides  the  then  popular  card  game,  manille,  Schiller 
was  very  fond  of  bowls.     He  and  Petersen  often  played 


8o  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

together  at  a  little  tavern  on  the  Hauptstadterstrasse, 
to  the  sign  of  "The  BuU."  Here  Doctor  Schiller,  as 
by  himself  and  by  others  he  was  generally  styled,  used 
often  to  indulge  in  a  lunch  of  ham  and  salad,  with, 
maybe,  half  a  pint  or  a  pint  of  wine.  The  best  snuff 
—  he  had  learnt  to  like  this  at  the  academy  —  the 
best  snuff,  forsooth,  was  a  luxury  outside  his  means, 
nor  could  he  aflbrd  to  give  much  care  to  his  dress. 
Kronenbitter,  his  soldier-servant,  helped  little  to  in- 
crease the  comfort  or  the  order  of  his  bachelor  estabhsh- 
ment ;  yet  Schiller  would  but  repay  the  worthy  fellow's 
blundering  negligence  by  some  imprecation  in  w^hich 
the  humour  was  blent  with  the  abuse. 

At  the  beginning  of  April  Schiller  stated  his  much 
revised,  much  altered  play  "  The  Robbers,"  to  be  com- 
plete. Following  Petersen's  suggestion,  he  had  added 
largely  to  it,  and  it  was  now  to  be  published  anony- 
mously. The  preface  had  been  written  some  time 
before.  His  piece,  so  it  put  forth,  was  not  meant  for 
the  stage,  even  though  the  author  would  feel  fortunate 
did  it  win  notice  from  some  Roscius  of  his  fatherland. 
He  spoke  most  slightingly  of  actors  and  of  the  general 
theatregoing  pubhc,  albeit  that  he  knew  so  very  little 
of  either  class.  Hoven  having  failed  to  find  him  a 
pubhsher,  Petersen  was  deputed  to  do  so,  who,  however, 
thought  the  matter  not  void  of  risk.  If  Schiller  was 
anxious  to  secure  the  ear  and  the  verdict  of  a  wider 
public  for  his  poetry,  he  hoped  hkewise  to  gain  money 
by  it.  In  an  extraordinary  letter  to  Petersen,  while 
with  his  brother  at  Speier,  he  urgently  begs  him  when 
at  Mannheim  to  find  a  pubhsher  wilhng  to  buy  the 
copyright.  His  first  and  foremost  aim  in  asking  this 
he  confessed  to  be  "  mammon,  omnipotent  mammon." 
So  great  was  his  need  of  money  that  he  requests 
Petersen  to  send  him  the  sum  derived  from  various 
books  he  had  commissioned  him  to  sell ;  they  would 
surely  fetch  four    or   five  gulden ;  and  to   Kapf  and 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  8i 

himself  these  would  just  now  be  of  real  service.  He 
should  be  quite  content  to  get  fifty  gulden  for  his 
manuscript,  and  anything  above  that  amount  would 
in  all  right  and  honesty  go  to  Petersen.  His  second 
reason  he  states  to  be  a  wish  to  try  "  his  fortune  as 
author,  as  dramatist ;  "  the  expectation,  the  hope,  the 
curiosity  attending  the  venture,  would  shorten  and 
make  sweet  his  days  of  probation,  would  work  a  cure 
for  his  melancholy.  In  strange  contrast  to  the  other 
two,  we  learn  the  third  reason,  "  a  purely  genuine  one  " 
—  namely,  that  in  his  present  position  he  would  like 
to  gather  up  and  put  from  him  all  his  essays  in  poetic 
and  dramatic  literature,  as  they  could  but  hinder  his 
project  of  becoming  professor  of  medicine  and  physi- 
ology. Placed  as  he  now  was,  it  became  incumbent 
upon  him  to  work  at  one  thing,  and  at  one  only  ;  he 
meant,  therefore,  to  find  fortune  and  advancement  in  a 
post  that  would  allow  him  yet  further  to  prosecute 
his  physiological  and  philosophical  studies.  By  his 
soul  he  felt  driven  to  poetry,  yet  his  father's  warnings, 
as  also  his  circumstances,  led  him,  after  mature  reflec- 
tion, to  choose  a  profession  akin  to  his  scientific  bent, 
and  one  that  would  allow  him  to  be  of  support  to  his 
relations.  Somewhat  singular,  this  last  utterance,  com- 
ing as  it  does  immediately  after  the  wish  to  see  his 
"  Robbers "  in  type.  Success  would  surely  only 
heighten  his  passion  for  the  muse ;  neglect  or  censure 
could  alone  turn  him  from  her  charms.  No,  his  heart 
was  set  ardently  on  the  play's  publication.  We  see  this 
in  the  touch :  "  Look  here,  my  boy,  if  it  succeeds,  I  mean 
to  treat  myself  to  a  couple  of  bottles  of  Burgundy  ! "  We 
are  shown  it  at  the  letter's  end,  that  closes  with  the 
wild  belief  that  none  would  divine  the  author's  name, 
albeit  so  many  of  his  friends  had  already  heard  about 
the  play.  To  this  is  joined  the  yet  more  singular 
suggestion,  that  Petersen  should  in  this  case  give  out 
that  one  of  his  brothers  was  the  author ! 


82  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

However,  Petersen  could  find  no  one  to  publish  the 
play,  so,  in  spite  of  the  risk  of  being  known  as  a  poet, 
Schiller  resolved  to  issue  it  in  Stuttgart  at  his  own 
cost.  The  printer  required  surety  for  the  payment 
of  his  bill ;  how  this  was  forthconiiug  we  have  no 
means  of  knowing.  In  very  short  time  the  play  passed 
through  the  press.  Schiller  sent  the  first  seven  sheets 
of  proofs  to  Councillor  Schwan,  at  Mannheim.  Chris- 
tian Friedrich  Schwan  was  born  in  1733  at  Prenzlau. 
After  studying  theology  at  Halle  and  Jena,  he  went  to 
Russia.  Upon  the  death  of  the  Empress  Elizabeth, 
he  lost  his  patron  in  that  country.  Some  stir  was 
caused  by  a  volume  of  his,  pubhshed  in  Holland, 
entitled  "  Anecdotes  Russes ;  ou,  Lettres  d'un  Officier 
Allemand."  In  1764  he  started  a  w^eekly  literary 
journal  at  Fraukfort-on-the-Main ;  and  the  year  follow- 
ing, having  married  the  daughter  of  his  publisher 
Esslinger,  he  went  to  Mannheim,  to  manage  his  father- 
in-law's  business  there.  Here,  by  his  efforts  to  advance 
the  national  taste  in  literature,  he  soon  won  regard. 
He  translated  several  pieces  from  the  French,  and 
gave  his  aid  and  support  to  a  newly  formed  society 
for  purifying  the  German  tongue  and  for  raising  the 
public  taste.  He  strove,  likwise,  to  make  the  newly 
built  playhouse  a  home  for  national  dramatic  art.  He 
himself  took  a  journey  to  Lessiug,  in  order  to  gain 
that  writer's  help  for  the  Mannheim  Theatre.  And 
Lessing  gave  it ;  yet  the  matter  came  to  nothing. 
Schwan  had  great  influence  with  the  director  of  the 
Mannheim  National  Theatre,  that  had  been  opened  in 
the  autumn  of  1779  ;  besides  this  his  large  publishing 
business  brought  him  a  wide  connection,  so  to  Schiller 
his  interest  and  good-will  were  the  more  of  value 
And  Schwan,  he  to  whom  fortune  had  been  thus 
bountiful,  was  it  not  likely  that  he  would  gladly  recog- 
nise talent  of  sucli  a  stamp?  Fully  sensible  of  tlieir 
merit,  he  read  to  Dalberg  the  proofs  he  had  received, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  83 

expressing  to  the  author  his  interest  and  sympathy. 
Schiller  hastened  on  the  printing  with  the  utmost 
despatch;  he  made  sundry  corrections,  and  altered  the 
preface,  that,  in  its  original  form,  might  have  been 
damaging  to  him  in  the  eyes  of  a  class  upon  which 
must  depend  his  future  success.  Thus  in  the  new 
preface  he  terms  his  hero  "  a  quaint  Don  Quixote,"  and 
claims  for  his  work  a  place  among  moral  writings ; 
for,  said  he,  if  readers  were  careful  to  give  him  their 
attention,  and  did  they  wholly  grasp  his  meaning,  it 
would  be  the  morahst  rather  than  the  poet  whom  they 
would  praise.  This  was,  in  truth,  reversing  the  whole 
standpoint  of  the  piece,  was  putting  it  upon  another 
level ;  however,  it  did  duty  as  a  kind  of  apology  for  so 
powerful  a  drama  of  ruin  and  revolt. 

The  first  edition  of  eight  hundred  copies  was  ready 
in  July.  In  Stuttgart,  where  the  poet's  name  was 
soon  on  every  lip,  the  piece  created  large  stir.  Who 
could  have  looked  to  a  mere  academy  student  for  so 
trenchant  a  homily  upon  the  condition  of  citizens  and 
the  state !  who  could  have  expected  this  from  him,  a 
simple  army  doctor,  even  though  his  "  Funeral  Ode  " 
had  shown  him  to  be  possessed  of  liberal  ideas '  There 
was  a  general  wish  to  make  the  poet's  acquaintance, 
whose  humble  lodging  formed  but  a  poor  reception- 
room.  Scharffenstein  tells  us  that  it  contained,  be- 
sides a  large  table,  two  benches  and  a  wardrobe,  while, 
strewn  about,  in  one  corner  lay  quires  upon  quires 
of  manuscript  verse,  and  in  the  other  piles  of  potatoes, 
bottles,  and  plates.  Of  all  those  who  now  sought  the 
poet's  friendship,  no  one  was  more  welcome  to  him 
than  the  kind-hearted  Streicher,  who,  to  his  surprise, 
recognised  in  the  wild,  impetuous  dramatist  an  ex- 
pupil  of  the  academy.  This  he  knew  by  the  rapid 
eye-blinking,  by  the  oft-recurring  smile.  Schiller  was 
at  once  conscious  of  the  other's  true  and  heartfelt 
sympathy.     Streicher  writes: 


84  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

"  The  most  spiritual,  most  unassuming  of  counte- 
nances smiled  in  friendly  greeting  upon  the  newcomer. 
All  compliment  was  passed  over  and  evaded  in  a  win- 
ningly  modest  way.  When  conversing,  not  a  word 
was  uttered  that  could  have  wounded  the  most  sensi- 
tive. The  pale  complexion,  that  as  he  spoke  grew 
somewhat  flushed,  the  weakly  eyes,  the  hair  flung 
loosely  from  his  forehead,  the  white  bared  throat  — 
all  helped  to  impress  one  with  the  poet's  strange  indi- 
viduality, to  make  one  feel  that  he  stood  as  far  above 
the  mere  forms  of  society  as  were  his  strictures  upon 
its  laws."  Thus  soon  did  Schiller  show  his  savoir 
vivre,  in  adapting  his  manner  to  that  of  those  he  met. 
Just  as  he  was  merry  and  jocular  with  his  student 
friends,  just  as  he  could  show  an  unfeigned  interest 
in  the  worthy  Zumsteeg,  whose  musical  talent  he  did 
all  to  encourage  —  so  to  Streicher,  an  enthusiastic 
admirer,  he  held  out  all  the  affection,  all  the  sympathy 
of  his  nature;  and  there  was  soon  close  intimacy 
between  them  both.  His  relation  with  Solitude  was 
somewhat  embittered  by  his  father's  displeasure,  to 
whom  it  was  no  slight  annoyance  that  Fritz,  unmind- 
ful of  success  in  his  profession,  should  busy  himself 
with  other  matters  from  which  he  would  get  more  harm 
than  help ;  and  that,  while  fancying  himself  on  the 
road  to  renown,  in  spite  of  his  hmited  income,  he  did 
but  lead  a  loose,  unsettled  life.  From  his  mother  and 
Christophine,  on  the  other  hand,  he  ever  got  hearty 
welcome  each  time  that  he  came  there  to  visit  them, 
either  alone  or  with  friends.  Scharff  en  stein  has  given 
special  praise  to  Frau  Schiller's  great  cordiality.  With 
kind-hearted  Christophine,  Fritz  had  thorough  sym- 
pathy ;  she  took  deep  interest  in  his  poems,  and  copied 
out  several  for  him.  It  was  with  her  that  he  revisited 
his  beloved  Lorch,  where  first  he  had  felt  his  soul 
astir  within  him. 

Nor,  though  the  drama  engaged  him,  did  he  forsake 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  85 

the  lyric  muse ;  her  voice  now  rose  upon  the  air, 
wherein  were  mingled  notes  of  scorn  and  tenderness, 
of  insult  and  unbounded  passion.  We  hear  them  in 
the  lyrics  addressed  to  Laura,  a  name  that  occurs  con- 
stantly in  Klopstock's  fantastic  love-songs.  He  had  yet 
high  esteem  for  Klopstock,  although,  ere  this,  he  had 
seen  that  in  many  of  his  odes  there  was  more  of 
rhapsody  than  real  feeling.  According  to  Scharffen- 
stein,  "  Laura  "  was  none  other  than  the  young  widow 
landlady ;  a  purely  Platonic  attachment,  this,  and 
nothing  more.  For  just  to  these  odes  is  lacking  the 
sensuousness,  the  zest,  the  abandon  of  early  love. 
Schiller  does  but  celebrate  a  gentle,  kindly  matron, 
with  whose  children  he  loved  to  play ;  she  who 
showed  him  such  interest,  whose  music  soothed  him 
in  moments  of  sorrow,  it  is  she  whom  he  makes  the 
ideal  of  his  fantastic  affection.  This  was  what  he 
himself  termed  it  two  years  later,  comparing  it  to  that 
of  Don  Quixote  for  his  Dulcinea. 

Dalberg  and  Schwan,  to  whom  he  had  sent  his 
"  Robbers,"  commissioned  him  to  prepare  it  for  the 
stage.  Either  Schwan  was  to  publish  it,  or  it  could 
appear  in  a  collection  of  dramas  arranged  for  the 
Mannheim  Theatre.  Dalberg  secured  the  copyright 
for  himself  and  offered  to  accept  other  plays  that 
Schiller  might  write  later  on.  On  August  17th  the  poet 
had  hopes  of  finishing  his  work  in  a  couple  of  weeks. 
"  As  yet  I  am  free  and  untrammelled,"  he  writes  to 
Dalberg,  "  and  I  shall  deem  it  high  fortune  if,  with  all 
that  is  in  me,  I  may  share  your  Excellency's  ardent 
love  for  literature."  With  so  distinguished  a  patron, 
he  believed  his  future  to  be  assured ;  not  a  thought 
was  given  any  longer  to  the  professorship  of  physiology 
and  medicine.  But  this  work  of  rearrangement  took 
up  more  time  than  he  expected.  An  outbreak  of  ill- 
ness in  his  regiment  formed  one  cause  of  delay  ;  another 
was  his  acquaintance  with  the  mother  of  Wolzogen. 


86  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Henrietta,  Baroness  Wolzogen,  had  also  sent  her  young- 
est son  to  the  Military  Academy.  Three  of  her  chil- 
dren were  now  at  Solitude,  and  she  determined  to 
place  her  daughter  in  the  "  Pension  "  there,  and  next 
year  to  settle  in  Stuttgart,  where  Franciska  took  a 
great  interest  in  her  family.  The  baroness  had  sought 
to  be  introduced  to  her  son's  friend,  the  speedily  famous 
author  of  "  The  Eobbers."  She  took  a  great  liking  to 
him.  Schiller  also  became  sincerely  attached  to  her, 
who  had  his  good  so  deeply  at  heart,  and  who  knew 
the  disagreeables  connected  with  his  position.  As  he 
himself  tells  us,  she  was  the  sole  woman  who,  besides 
his  mother,  had  a  deep  hold  upon  his  sympathies.  He 
took  her  also  to  Solitude,  where  the  high-born  lady 
was  received  with  every  honour.  Schiller  fere,  little 
as  he  might  approve  of  his  son's  career,  had  to  hide  his 
discontent,  now  that  Dalberg  had  laid  open  to  Fritz  so 
promising  a  future.  Conz,  one  of  Schiller's  playmates 
at  Lorch,  was  staying  for  a  time  in  Stuttgart,  and  he 
came  to  renew  their  friendship.  He  had  actually  gone 
through  that  course  of  study  from  which  the  duke  had 
held  Schiller  back.  Although  not  yet  twenty,  he  had 
taken  his  degree,  and  filled  an  honorary  post  at  Tubin- 
gen. The  poet  must,  in  sooth,  have  been  thankful  to 
have  escaped  a  like  fate  ;  moreover,  such  a  career  would 
have  been  impossible  to  him.  Conz,  like  Petersen,  had 
WTitten  a  drama  upon  the  last  of  the  Hohenstaufen, 
and  there  was  much  that  made  the  meeting  of  genuine 
pleasure  to  both.  Some  of  the  impetuous  surgeon's 
utterances  may  perhaps  have  shocked  Conz  somewhat, 
who  looked  on  terror-struck,  as  the  poet,  when  Kapf 
had  taken  the  key  of  his  room,  broke  open  the  door 
with  a  tremendous  kick.  Thus,  though  still  in  nar- 
rowed and  humble  circumstances,  his  life  was  cheered 
by  intercourse  with  so  many  friends  and  acquaintances. 
On  September  21st  Schiller,  first  of  all,  sent  the  act- 
ing version  of  his  play  to  Petersen,  asking  him  freely 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  87 

and  impartially  to  alter  and  criticise  both  dialogue, 
characters,  and  plot.  The  longer,  the  more  detailed 
such  criticism  was,  the  better  he  should  like  it.  Not 
until  October  6th  could  he  send  Dalberg  the  play,  that, 
after  following  Petersen's  suggestions,  had  been  turned 
into  a  tragedy.  During  the  interval,  while  awaiting 
answer,  he  renewed  his  acquaintance  with  the  poet  still 
imprisoned  at  Asberg. 

It  was  not  until  the  close  of  1780  that  Schubart 
was  allowed  greater  liberty ;  he  might  now  receive 
visits  from  friends.  Von  Eieger,  the  commandant  of 
the  fortress,  made  him  manager  of  the  theatre  there, 
at  which  prisoners  and  soldiers  used  to  act.  It  so 
happened  that  Hoven  was  present  at  a  performance 
given  in  honour  of  the  general's  birthday,  on  October 
1st;  Rieger  begged  him  often  to  come  there,  and  asked 
him  to  bring  his  godson,  the  famous  author  of  "  The 
Eobbers  "  with  him.  Hoven  assented,  and  the  general 
accordingly  bade  Schubart  embody  in  a  critique  his 
opinion  of  the  play  that  in  so  brief  a  time  had  gair.c^d 
such  great  success.  Schiller  came.  They  introduced 
him  to  Schubart  as  a  certain  Doctor  Fischer,  a  special 
friend  of  the  dramatist.  Ere  long  they  began  to  talk 
of  the  play,  and  "  Doctor  Fischer "  desiring  to  hear 
Schubart's  verdict,  Rieger  got  him  to  read  his  critique 
aloud,  that  closed  with  the  wish  to  make  the  illus- 
trious poet's  personal  acquaintance.  "  Your  wish  is 
granted,"  struck  in  Rieger,  patting  him  on  the  shoul- 
der. "  There  he  stands  before  you."  "  Is  it  possible  ? " 
cried  Schubart  in  glee  "  Tliat,  then,  is  the  author  of 
'  The  Robbers.' "  Falling  in  joy  upon  his  neck,  he 
embraced  him  warmly  and  gave  him  his  blessing. 
They  met  each  other  several  times  after  this  occur- 
rence. 

From  another  of  Suabia's  famous  poets,  from  Wie- 
land,  to  whom  he  had  sent  his  drama,  Schiller  won 
words  of  encouragement  and  praise.    In  his  own  enthu- 


88  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

siastic  way,  Wieland  recognised  the  qualities  of  strange- 
ness, of  originality,  in  this  powerful  work,  wherewith 
the  poet  should  have  closed  his  career,  not  begun  it. 
But  he  had  no  intention  of  noticing  the  play  in  his 
journal,  Mercur,  for,  despite  its  power,  it  was  thoroughly 
against  all  his  own  sympathies. 

Dalberg's  illness  served  to  delay  his  much-looked- 
for  answer.  On  November  3d  Schiller  proceeds  to 
reply  to  his  criticisms.  He  was  surprised  that  Dal- 
berg  should  so  totally  have  missed  the  play's  poetic 
side ;  in  a  drama  this  was  distinctly  a  gain,  so  he 
thought.  For  the  rest,  the  impatient  author  had  to 
yield  in  all  points  to  the  wishes  of  his  Excellency  the 
intendant.  He  consented  even  to  the  unreasonable 
postponement  of  the  performance  until  after  the  war. 
He  also  agreed  to  write  a  short  prologue,  headed  "  The 
Author  to  the  Public,"  that  was  to  be  printed  on  the 
play-bill.  His  imagination  was  already  at  work  upon 
another  theme  for  dramatic  treatment,  that  of  Fiesco, 
the  Genoese.  Rousseau  had  led  him  to  this  choice ; 
the  historical  facts  connected  with  the  conspiracy  he 
had  got  from  Robertson's  "  History  of  Charles  V."  when 
preparing  his  prize  essay  at  the  IMilitary  Academy. 
He  now  went  on  to  master  the  subject  in  its  details, 
to  familiarise  himself  with  the  early  history  and  con- 
stitution of  Genoa. 

"  The  Robbers  "  had  meantime  become  out  of  print, 
as  Schiller  had  sold  the  remaining  copies  to  a  second- 
hand bookseller.  Another  edition  was  therefore  neces- 
sary, wliich  Loffler  undertook  to  publish.  A  newly 
added  vignette  of  a  lion  rampant,  with  the  motto  "  In 
Tirannos,"  gave  proof  of  the  republican  tendency  of 
the  work.  In  the  preface,  dated  January  5,  1782,  it 
is  promised  that  the  printing  shall  be  marked  by  accu- 
racy, and  that  all  phrases  of  double  meaning,  offensive, 
perhaps,  to  a  more  refined  section  of  readers,  shall  be 
left  away.     Nevertheless,  here  and  there  only  a  coarse 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  89 

expression  was  excised,  while,  to  the  many  gross  typo- 
graphical blunders,  fresh  ones  were  added. 

Dalberg  announced  that  the  piece  would  be  per- 
formed on  the  10th  or  12th  of  January.  Franciska's 
birthday,  however,  fell  on  the  first  of  these  dates. 
This  time  it  was  to  be  kept  with  special  grandeur, 
and  Schiller  must  necessarily  be  there.  So,  in  order 
that  the  poet  might  witness  the  first  performance  of 
his  drama,  it  was  postponed  until  the  13th.  Kapf, 
Schiller's  fellow  lodger,  had  left  him  during  this  time, 
having  received  an  appointment  as  military  instructor 
at  a  school. 

Without  obtaining  official  leave,  but  having  informed 
the  colonel  of  his  intended  absence,  Schiller  set  out  for 
Mannheim  with  Petersen,  who  was  about  to  visit  his 
brother  at  Speier.  This  journey  was  the  longest  he 
had  as  yet  made.  What  feelings  must  have  been  his 
as  he  first  set  eyes  upon  the  frontier  of  the  Kurpfalz ! 
Their  carriage  passed  through  Bretten,  Melancthon's 
home,  and  Wagahusel  on  its  way  to  Schwetzingen. 

On  Sunday,  January  13th,  at  five  o'clock  p.m.  (the 
length  of  the  piece  made  such  early  commencement 
necessary),  Schiller  found  himself  seated  next  to 
Petersen  in  the  handsome  National  Theatre  at  Mann- 
heim. The  house  was  filled  to  overflowing  with  an 
audience  from  far  and  near ;  there  were  some,  even, 
who  had  driven  from  Frankfort  and  Mainz  in  order  to 
see  the  much  talked-of  piece.  Up  till  now,  Schiller 
had  never  witnessed  the  performance  of  a  hond-jide 
German  play ;  for  in  Stuttgart,  besides  Italian  opera, 
farces  and  vaudevilles  were  all  that  were  acted,  the 
performers  being  drawn  from  the  ranks  of  the  academy 
and  the  ecole.  As  Schiller  says,  the  theatre  there  was 
as  yet  in  its  teens ;  here,  on  the  other  hand,  he  was 
to  see  three  of  Eckhof's  most  talented  pupils,  besides 
other  artists  having  sound  and  thorough  training.  By 
strange  fortune  the  actors  Beck,  Beil,  and  Iffland,  firm 


90  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

in  their  friendship  and  devoted  to  their  art,  were  all 
three  included  in  the  cast.  It  had  been  found  neces- 
sary to  divide  the  play  into  seven  acts.  In  the  bill, 
the  time  of  action  was  preposterously  enough  fixed  as 
being  "  the  year  in  which  Emperor  Maximihan  had 
given  to  Germany  perpetual  peace."  The  opening 
scenes  failed  of  their  looked-for  eh'ect ;  the  four  last 
acts,  however,  were  received  with  thunders  of  ap- 
plause. The  chief  honours  of  the  night  fell  to  If  Hand, 
then  in  his  three  and  twentieth  year,  who  played  Franz, 
a  part  for  the  success  of  which  Schiller  had  been  most 
anxious.  The  actor  gave  a  vivid,  finished,  and  deeply 
impressive  picture  of  the  thorough-paced  villain  ;  as  a 
masterful  study  in  psychology,  no  less  than  in  elocu- 
tion, it  must  have  had  its  lesson  for  the  dramatist  also. 
Schiller,  who  had  pictured  his  hero  tall  and  gaunt,  felt 
at  the  first  some  disappointment  when  Bock's  little 
wizened  figure  trod  the  boards.  This  drawback  was, 
however,  soon  forgotten  as  he  watched  his  splendid 
acting,  full  of  fire  and  passion,  and  showing  such  a 
thorough  grasp  of  the  author's  meaning.  Beil,  young, 
handsome,  and  enthusiastic,  was  an  ideal  type  of  the 
brave,  true-hearted  Switzer.  Beck  looked  in  all  re- 
spects the  gallant  Kosinsky  ;  and  with  Meyer's  reading 
of  Hermann,  Schiller  was  exceptionally  pleased.  The 
other  r81e  for  which  he  had  feared  was  that  of  Amalia. 
But  Madame  Toscani  played  it  with  great  feeling  and 
charm,  if  at  times  she  was  a  trifle  too  lachrymose. 
For  Iffland,  Bock,  and  Beil  the  author  had  most  praise, 
even  though  he  did  not  entirely  agree  with  their  con- 
ception of  the  characters.  Dalberg  had  given  special 
care  and  attention  to  the  dresses,  scenery,  and  general 
mounting  of  the  play,  and  never  before  on  the  Mann- 
heim stage  had  a  piece  produced  such  an  effect.  After 
the  performance  Schiller  and  Petersen  joined  the  actors 
at  supper,  who  were  one  and  all  elated  by  their  suc- 
cess.    What   an    impression    must    the    glowing    con- 


THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  91 

gratulations  from  the  three  brother-artists  have  made 
upon  Schiller!  He  held  long  and  detailed  conversa- 
tion with  Schwan  and  Dalberg  upon  dramatic  art,  and 
was  firm  in  his  resolve  to  follow  the  career  of  play- 
wright. He  made  mention  about  his  "  Fiesco "  to 
Dalberg,  who  proposed  that  he  should  prepare  a  stage 
version  of  Goethe's  "  Goetz."  He  wished  also  to  pro- 
vide him  with  fresh  material  for  another  play.  Yet, 
friendly  as  were  his  offers,  he  said  no  word  that  could 
in  the  least  have  compromised  him.  Schiller  received 
four  Carolines  for  his  travelling  expenses ;  he  had 
stipulated  for  this  sum.  Overjoyed,  the  poet  quitted 
Mannheim,  where  he  had  taken  note  of  much  that  he 
determined  should  serve  him  in  work  to  be  produced 
hereafter. 


CHAPTER   II. 

FROM   JANUARY   TO   SEPTEMBER,    1782. 

Fortunately,  his  absence  from  his  regiment,  where 
officially  he  was  on  the  sick  list,  had  not  been  noticed. 
The  duties  to  which  he  now  returned  had  never 
seemed  more  irksome  to  him.  He  meditated  writing 
a  detailed  criticism  upon  the  Mannheim  performance, 
wherein  he  intended  to  point  out  certain  shortcomings 
in  the  conception  of  some  of  the  scenes.  His  new 
play,  "  Fiesco,"  likewise  engaged  him,  and  the  historical 
nature  of  the  subject  presented  to  him  no  slight  diffi- 
culty. He  found  it  easier  to  invoke  his  lyric  muse  in 
the  task  of  extinguishing  Staudlin,  a  local  poetaster, 
who,  in  his  vanity,  aimed  at  wielding  the  national 
lyre.  To  the  verse  written  while  at  the  academy,  and 
for  the  most  part  needing  merely  revision,  much  had 
been  added  during  the  past  year ;  and  now  the  lyric 
vein  flowed  anew  within  him.  His  little  "  Anthology 
for  the  Year  1782"  was  soon  got  together;  Haug, 
Petersen,  and  Von  Hoven  contributed  to  the  volume. 
The  poems  had  ciphers  as  their  only  signature ;  under 
twenty-two  of  them,  together  with  the  preface  and 
dedication,  stood  Schiller's  initial ;  yet  it  is  likely  that 
he  was  the  author  of  many  more ;  probably  two-thirds 
of  them  were  from  his  pen.  Among  these  must  be 
counted  the  lyrical  operetta  "  Semele,"  that  he  and  his 
sister  had  once  acted  at  Sohtude.  This  alone  filled 
over  forty  pages  of  the  book.  Only  in  one  instance 
did  he   sign  himself  as  "  Author  of  '  The  Robbers.' " 

92 


THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  93 

Varied,  uneven  as  are  these  productions  in  style  and 
in  tone,  they  yet  give  proof  of  great  power,  of  singu- 
lar skill  in  versification ;  side  by  side  vdth  these 
qualities  we  have,  nevertheless,  much  that  is  high- 
flown  and  disappointing  and  coarse.  A  national  war- 
song  celebrating  one  of  Wiirtemberg's  heroes,  Count 
Eberhard  the  Grumbler,  is  marked  by  great  freshness ; 
another  poem,  and  one  of  the  best,  entitled  "  The  In- 
fanticide," may  have  had  fact  for  its  basis.  Besides 
the  odes  to  Laura,  there  were  many  love-lyrics ;  not 
one,  however,  seems  to  have  been  inspired  by  actual 
passion.  The  ease  with  which  he  could  realise  scenes 
unfamiliar  to  him  is  best  shown  in  the  description  of 
a  battle  narrated  by  an  oificer  supposed  to  have  been 
present.  There  is  a  bitter  dash  of  scorn  in  the  "  Evil 
Monarch,"  while  the  fragment  "  To  a  Moralist "  verges 
on  the  gross.  In  "The  Muse's  Revenge,"  and  the 
humourous  dream  entitled  "  Minos  and  the  Journalists," 
the  irony  is  aimed  at  Staudlin,  his  rival.  Rousseau  is 
held  up  as  a  martyr ;  in  one  epigram,  Spinoza's  zealous 
champions  are  ridiculed;  in  another,  Wieland  is  pro- 
claimed the  poet  of  this  world,  Klopstock  being  the 
bard  of  the  next.  The  volume  was  in  all  points  worthy 
of  the  author  of  "  The  Robbers ; "  like  the  play,  it  was 
full  of  unbridled  force  and  energy.  But  if  this  poetry 
achieved  a  less  wide,  less  notable  success,  it  was  be- 
cause the  interest  in  a  drama  where  characters  of 
different  type  live  and  move  for  us  must  always  be 
keener  and  more  genuine  than  that  given  to  lyric 
verse,  wherein  the  author  can  but  show  you  his  own 
personality,  can  but  speak  to  you  in  his  ov^i  voice. 
Great  offence,  too,  was  given  by  the  poet's  allusion  to 
Wlirtemberg  as  "  a  very  Siberia  for  the  intellect,"  and 
the  "Anthology"  was  generally  looked  upon  as  a 
boyish  attempt  to  take  the  wind  out  of  Staudlin's 
sails.  Still  it  was  gratifying  to  Schiller  that  Schubart 
and  Rieger  should  give  the  volume  such  enthusiastic 


94  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

welcome.  The  former,  in  his  words  of  praise,  falls 
into  sheer  rhapsody.  He  writes  to  his  wife  :  "  Schiller's 
a  great  fellow ;  I  love  him  ardently.  Greet  him  from 
me."  Outside  Wiirtemberg,  the  "  Anthology "  was 
scarcely  known. 

Not  content  with  eclipsing  Staudlin,  he  sought  to 
take  over  the  editorship  of  the  Suahian  Magazine  that 
Haug  had  relinquished  the  year  before,  and  to  continue 
its  issue  in  a  more  important  form.  He  ever  felt  deep 
desire  to  live  and  move  in  the  world  of  letters,  to  have 
a  voice,  an  influence  therein  as  well.  Certainly  there 
was  another  reason  —  the  wish  to  increase  his  income 
by  a  stipend  however  meagre.  In  all  haste  he  deter- 
mined, with  the  joint  aid  of  Petersen  and  Abel,  to 
issue  a  quarterly  journal,  of  which  the  first  number, 
entitled  TJie  Wilrtcmhcrg  Repertory,  stated  to  be 
"  printed  at  the  editor's  cost,"  was  at  once  to  appear. 
Besides  original  essays  and  tales,  critiques  of  current 
literature  were  to  be  pubUshed  in  its  pages,  critiques 
unsparingly  candid  and  severe,  to  judge  from  the  lines 
of  Virgil  taken  as  a  motto.  Schiller  wrote  under 
various  initials.  His  opening  essay  was  upon  the 
"  Present  Condition  of  the  German  Stage."  The  rea- 
son, he  said,  that  it  failed  to  have  good  influence 
upon  morals  was  owing  to  the  three  powers  concerned 
in  its  support  —  the  public,  the  playwrights,  and  the 
actors.  So  long  as  the  public  merely  sought  amuse- 
ment, it  was  vain  to  pretend  that  the  national  theatre 
was  also  a  school  of  morals.  The  German  dramatist, 
like  the  English,  had  the  faculty  of  seizing  Nature  at 
her  very  heart's  core ;  what  he  lacked  was  the  human- 
ising touch,  the  art  of  bringing  her  grandeur  home  to 
man.  Actors  fall  under  the  charge  of  self-conscious- 
ness ;  they  do  not  utterly  sink  themselves  in  their 
part.  Certainly,  when  writing  this,  Schiller's  knowl- 
edge of  the  stage  and  its  requirements  was  quite  an 
insuflBcient  one.     In  a  dialogue  called  "  A  Walk  under 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  95 

the  Lindens,"  two  temperaments  are  contrasted :  the 
one  bright,  gay,  and  finding  enjoyment  in  nature  and  in 
hfe ;  the  other  self-torturing  and  pessimistic.  Among 
the  critiques  from  Schiller's  pen  there  is  one  on  the 
acting  edition  of  his  own  drama.  He  ruthlessly  at- 
tacks the  weak  points  of  the  play,  and  so  little  does 
he  spare  himself  that  this  is  the  grim  allusion  to  the 
author  with  which  the  paper  ends : 

"  Turning  to  the  back  of  a  picture,  one  naturally 
looks  for  the  author's  name.  Unfortunately,  all  his 
learning  would  seem  to  have  been  got  hy  intuition. 
He  is  little  read  in  critical  literature,  choosing  maybe 
to  hold  his  own  opinions ;  this  one  may  see  by  the 
beauties  in  his  work,  no  less  than  by  its  egregious 
faults.  The  author  is  said  to  be  a  surgeon  attached  to 
a  battalion  of  Wiirtemberg  grenadiers ;  if  this  be  so,  it 
does  high  credit  to  the  sagacity  of  his  prince.  In  so 
far  as  I  understand  his  work,  he  would  seem  to  have 
as  great  a  liking  for  strong  doses  in  emeticis  as  in 
cestheticis  ;  I  would  liefer  give  him  ten  horses  to  cure 
than  my  wife."  He  takes  great  exception  to  the  char- 
acter of  Franz,  "  the  villain,"  who,  in  his  cold-blooded 
calculation,  would  be  the  last  to  use  such  flowery 
phrases  as  those  set  down  for  him  by  the  author.  For 
such  language  an  overwrought  imagination  could  form 
the  only  excuse.  The  dialogue  altogether  is  most  un- 
equal ;  from  the  lyrical  manner  we  pass  to  the  meta- 
physical ;  the  style  in  one  place  is  Biblical,  in  another, 
tame  and  bald.  Nor,  under  this  mask,  could  Schiller 
refrain  from  condemning  Dalberg's  absurd  alteration 
respecting  the  action  of  the  piece.  In  an  appendix  he 
prints  a  notice  of  the  opening  performance,  presumably 
written  by  a  native  of  Worms.  This  also  is  not  want- 
ing in  words  of  censure  for  the  poet,  who  is  told  that 
from  his  play  three  others  could  reasonably  have  been 
made,  each  one  producing  a  greater  effect.  Staudlin's 
"Anthology"  is  sharply  dealt  with,  although  the  re- 


96  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

viewer  admits  that  here  and  there,  amid  the  flood  of 
mediocrity,  "  above  the  frogscroak  of  mere  doggerel," 
one  could  catch  the  true  notes  of  Melpomene's 
lyre. 

Side  by  side  with  this  journalistic  work  Schiller 
busied  himself  with  his  "  Fiesco,"  and  several  of  its 
most  important  scenes  were  already  complete.  But 
his  poetry  writing  was  now  to  be  threatened  with  long 
interruption.  From  the  11th  to  the  17th  of  February 
Stuttgart  was  cii  fete,  on  the  occasion  of  the  Military 
Academy  being  changed  into  an  Imperial  University. 
On  the  11th,  the  duke's  birthday,  Schiller,  with  all 
his  brother-officers,  had  to  offer  "  The  Anointed  One " 
their  formal  congratulations.  After  pubHc  reading 
of  their  theses,  three  of  the  academy's  former  pupils 
were  awarded  degrees,  in  law,  in  medicine,  and  in 
philosophy.  The  duke,  once  opposed  to  the  study 
of  medicine,  was  anxious  that  many  of  his  academy 
pupils  should  take  the  opportunity  of  getting  their 
doctor's  degree  at  his  newly  founded  college  instead  of 
at  the  Tubingen  University.  Among  those  who  forth- 
with came  forward  was  Von  Hoven,  who  had  already 
partially  prepared  himself  for  passing.  And  Schiller, 
not  to  add  further  to  the  duke's  displeasure,  was 
obhged  to  follow  his  friend's  example.  Karl  Eugene 
had  meant  to  make  a  doctor  of  him,  and  a  doctor  he 
would  have  to  be,  although  he  himself  openly  declared 
that  he  looked  upon  his  profession,  not  as  a  mere  aid 
to  money-getting,  but  rather  as  a  philosophical  theory. 
Accordingly,  he  must  pass  his  examination  and  take 
his  degree.  Schiller's  appearance  as  a  poet,  and  more- 
over as  one  so  deeply  hostile  to  the  recognised  omnipo- 
tence of  princes,  had  been  vastly  displeasing  to  the 
duke.  In  commissioning  the  captive  Schubart  to 
write  a  prologue  and  epilogue  to  a  play  then  about 
to  be  acted  at  Sohtude,  called  "  Sophie ;  or,  the  Just 
Prince,"   he  thought  he  paid   full  tribute  to    an   art 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  97 

toward  which  he  was  so  utterly  indiffcreut.  And 
though  it  was  ever  clearer  to  him  that  he  harmed 
himself  by  such  injustice,  obstinacy  would  not  allow 
him  to  grant  the  poet  his  freedom.  He  would  guard, 
however,  against  giving  the  world  fresh  cause  to  blame 
his  violent  treatment  of  a  disciple  of  the  Muses ;  so  he 
took  no  steps  to  hinder  Schiller,  whose  scathing  allu- 
sions to  tyrannical  and  immoral  princes  must  have 
struck  him  to  the  quick.  Nor  did  his  father,  much 
grieved  as  he  was  at  all  his  son's  republican  writings, 
fail  to  give  him  urgent  warning,  begging  him  to  act 
with  regard  to  his  future  and  to  the  welfare  of  the 
family  that  would  hereafter  look  to  him  for  support. 
And  so  Schiller  finally  decided  upon  this,  to  him, 
repugnant  step.  To  Dalberg,  who  had  put  him  in 
mind  of  his  promised  dramatic  work,  he  was  obhged 
to  explain  that  circumstances  compelled  him  to  attend 
the  ducal  university,  where,  before  taking  his  degree, 
he  must  prepare  a  medical  dissertation.  Thus,  before 
six  months  were  past  he  had  little  hope  of  being  able 
to  indulge  his  taste  for  dramatic  composition,  or  of 
making  fresh  progress  in  an  art  that  formed  so  large 
a  portion  of  his  earthly  happiness.  However,  genius 
proved  stronger  than  professional  zeal ;  instead  of 
writing  his  medical  dissertation,  he  devoted  his  time 
to  "  Fiesco."  He  also  contributed  to  the  Bepertorium, 
under  the  title,  "A  Generous  Deed  in  Latter-day 
History,"  an  incident  told  to  him  by  the  Baroness 
Wolzogen ;  besides  making  some  Latin  epitaphs  upon 
Luther,  Kepler,  Haller,  and  Klopstock  the  subject  of 
an  essay.  At  Scharffenstein's  suggestion  he  composed 
a  strange  dialogue  between  a  youth  and  an  old  man,  in 
which  the  former  affirms  the  soul's  condition  to  be  one 
of  ceaseless  struggle,  that  the  root  of  pleasure  lay  alone 
in  its  anticipation,  that  enjoyment  was  lost  in  the 
realisation.  "  Eternity  is  the  career  toward  which  I 
press,"  says  one  passage.     "  By  my  manifold  longings 


98  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

I  shall  steal  forth  amid  the  spirit-crowd  that   moves 
ever  onward  to  God." 

The  sudden  death  on  May  15th  of  his  godfather 
Kieger  revived  his  lyric  muse.  In  a  I'uneral  Ode  he 
praises  the  grandeur  of  the  deceased,  who,  instead  of 
"  truckling  to  earthly  deities,"  instead  of  "  buying  the 
good  will  of  magnates  with  a  people's  curse,"  had  pleaded 
the  cause  of  the  innocent,  had  loved  humanity  above  the 
"  tinselled  sham  of  greatness,"  so  that,  in  the  blessings  of 
those  beyond  the  grave,  he  would  gain  more  than  from  a 
duke's  favour  or  cross  of  chivalry.  The  less  that 
Rieger  merited  such  praise  —  he  who  in  his  day  had 
basely  oppressed  the  subjects  under  liim  —  so  far  more 
biting  seemed  the  scorn  that  the  poet  hurled  at  the 
"  childish  conceit "  of  "  earthly  deities,"  at  the  yearned- 
for  smiles  of  princes,  at  all  the  vanity  and  pomp  of 
those  in  power.  The  whole  poem  must  needs  give 
bitter  offence  to  the  duke.  When  it  appeared,  he  was 
absent  from  Stuttgart,  having  gone  on  the  20th  to 
Vienna  with  Franciska,  where  he  stayed  for  ten  days. 
During  his  absence  Schiller  profited  by  the  chance  to 
visit  Mannheim,  where  he  could  give  Dalberg  a  per- 
sonal explanation.  Thither  he  resolved  to  go  with  the 
Baroness  Wolzogen  and  Madame  Vischer,  to  whom  he 
had  told  much  of  the  performance  of  his  drama.  Ac- 
cordingly, he  informed  Dalberg  on  the  24th  that  next 
day  he  would  start  for  Mannheim,  bringing  with  him 
some  ladies  and  friends,  in  order,  if  possible,  to  be 
present  at  another  and  more  complete  representation 
of  "  The  Eobbers."  To  have  seen  this  would  be  all 
the  greater  gain  to  him  when  at  work  upon  the  piece 
he  had  in  hand.  He  must,  however,  leave  Mannheim 
again  on  tlie  night  of  the  28th.  Hoven  was  also  invited 
to  join  the  party,  that  at  one  o'clock  on  the  25th 
drove  out  of  Stuttgart  in  a  four  post-chaise.  This 
second  successful  performance  of  his  tragedy  filled 
Schiller  with  fresh  dramatic  ardour.     At  the  same  time 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  99 

he  revived  his  genial  intimacy  with  the  actors ;  Meyer, 
one  of  the  older  of  these,  received  him  with  special 
friendliness.  He  had  a  long  talk  with  Dalberg,  during 
which  he  frankly  told  him  of  his  great  longing  to 
devote  himself  entirely  to  the  drama.  Dalberg  pointed 
out  the  difficulty  of  obtaining  the  duke's  consent,  yet 
promised  to  help  him  so  far  as  it  lay  within  his  power. 
He  gave  him  a  copy  of  H.  L.  Wagner's  dramas,  dedi- 
cated to  himself ;  also  St.  E^al's  romance  of  "  Don 
Carlos."  He  wished  to  have  his  opinion  upon  the 
one  book ;  the  other  might  possibly  yield  matter  for 
an  effective  drama. 

Immediately  upon  his  return  Schiller  was  seized 
with  an  attack  of  influenza,  which  in  Germany  that 
season  had  been  widely  prevalent.  Hardly  had  he 
recovered  when  he  writes  to  Dalberg  complaining  that 
no  one  could  be  more  unfortunate  than  he ;  sensible 
of  his  melancholy  position  —  sensible,  too,  that  he 
deserved  a  better  lot ;  and  yet  but  one  prospect 
stared  him  in  the  face !  He  makes  passionate  appeal 
to  Dalberg's  generosity,  imploring  him  to  help  him 
in  his  need  by  means  of  one  or  two  letters  ad- 
dressed to  the  duke,  and  written  with  a  due  regard  for 
his  crotchets.  To  win  his  favour,  one  had  but  to 
flatter  his  vanity  respecting  the  academy.  So  Dalberg 
must  say  that  he  considered  Schiller  as  the  duke's 
'proUgi  and  nursling  —  brought  up,  instructed  at  his 
matchless  institution.  It  were  also  well  to  fix  some 
period  during  which  he  wished  SchiUer  to  be  with  him 
at  Mannheim ;  thus  his  absence  would  seem  the  rather 
a  temporary  one,  instead  of  an  escape  for  good  and 
all.  And  to  meet  the  possible  objection  that  such  a 
course  would  be  against  Schiller  s  own  good,  it  could 
be  urged  that  he  meant  at  Mannheim  to  pursue  his 
medical  studies,  just  as  before.  All  this  was  cleverly 
enough  planned,  maybe,  but  Dalberg  only  saw  the 
clearer  how  vain  it  was  to  hope  for  the  duke's  consent 


loo  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

to  such  a  request,  and  how  easily  he  might  fall  from 
favour  by  making  it.  So,  in  all  courtesy,  he  decUned 
to  interfere. 

And  now  fresh  misfortune  was  at  hand.  The  story 
of  his  journey  into  "  foreign  parts  "  had  got  abroad  ;  it 
reached  the  ears  of  the  duke.  He  was  highly  wroth 
at  so  flagrant  a  breach  of  disciphne  on  the  part  of  the 
army  surgeon,  who  had  thus  disregarded  duty  for  the 
following  out  of  presumptuous  theories  of  his  own. 
He  sent  for  Schiller,  whom  he  severely  reprimanded, 
charging  him  with  gross  neglect  of  the  duties  of  his 
profession.  For  fourteen  days  he  was  to  consider  him- 
self under  arrest.  The  duke  was  informed  that  the 
poet's  absence  had  been  known  to  his  colonel  in  com- 
mand, Oberst  von  Eau.  Schiller,  however,  absolutely 
denied  this,  for  he  wished  to  save  the  kind-hearted 
man  from  disgrace.  Eau  had  such  fear  that  the  truth 
might  eventually  be  known,  that  he  studiously  avoided 
encountering  Schiller  in  public ;  they  met  privately 
at  night-time,  when  the  prisoner  used  to  assure  his 
superior  that  he  would  never  betray  him.  While 
under  arrest  he  worked  at  "  Fiesco."  It  was  told  to  his 
father  that  he  had  been  gambling,  and  had  lost  heavily. 
Directly  he  is  free,  he  writes  to  Dalberg  an  account  of 
what  had  occurred,  urging  him  to  procure  him  the 
suggested  appointment  without  delay.  He  could  not 
venture  in  a  letter  to  state  the  reason  that  now  made 
him  doubly  anxious  for  this  change ;  the  duke's  com- 
mand was  that  he  should  devote  himself  wholly  to  his 
profession. 

"  Only  this  much  I  can  tell  you  for  certain,  that  if, 
by  good  luck,  I  do  not  come  to  you  within  few  months, 
there  will  be  no  further  chance  that  I  can  ever  Hve 
with  you.  I  shall  then  be  forced  to  take  a  step  that 
will  make  it  impossible  for  me  to  stay  in  Mannheim." 
It  was  a  yet  further  flight  that  he  had  in  view.  Although 
she    looked    to    the   duke    for    her    sou's    promotion, 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  lOl 

Madame  von  Wolzogen's  deep  interest  in  Schiller  led 
her  to  offer  him  refuge  at  Bauerbach,  a  lonely  hamlet 
near  Meiningeu.  From  her  house  there  he  could  easily 
escape  to  Leipzig  or  Berhn.  As  a  final  bait  for  Dal- 
bero's  favour,  Schiller  states  that  "  Fiesco "  is  to  be 
ready  by  the  middle  of  August,  and  that  "  Don  Carlos  " 
will  probably  form  one  of  his  next  subjects. 

But  his  misfortunes  were  to  be  yet  further  increased. 
Spiegelberg's  allusion  in  "  The  Eobbers  "  to  Graubunden 
as  the  Athens  of  latter-day  thieves  called  forth  vigorous 
objection  in  several  German  prints.  One  editor,  all 
zealous  for  redress,  commissioned  a  friend  of  his  in 
Ludwigsburg,  one  Walter,  to  extort  from  the  poet  per- 
sonal withdrawal  of  the  offending  phrase.  Walter, 
good,  worthy  soul,  thmking  to  do  his  ruler  a  service, 
goes  in  hot  haste  to  tell  him  of  the  whole  affair.  The 
duke,  whom  pubhc  attacks  upon  his  academy  and 
disputes  with  the  States  had  already  angered,  was 
highly  incensed  at  this  insult  offered  by  one  of  his 
ex-pupils  to  a  neighbouring  province.  He  determined 
to  prevent  the  recurrence  of  what  threatened  to  harm 
his  own  supreme  authority.  Not  deigning  to  grant 
Schiller  a  personal  interview,  he  sent  him,  on  August 
27th,  an  official  mandate,  by  which  "  all  further  literary 
work  or  communication  with  other  countries"  was 
distinctly  vetoed.  Disobedience  to  so  despotic  an 
order  would  of  a  certainty  result  in  imprisonment  at 
the  fortress ;  Schiller's  only  safety  lay  in  flight ;  yet 
how  to  flee  he  saw  not.  He  felt  surer,  more  certain 
than  ever,  of  his  poetic  talent ;  Stiiudlin's  cheap  sar- 
casm about  a  colossal  genius,  a  second  Shakespeare, 
passed  him  unheeded.  The  thought  of  his  father's 
anger  at  his  flight,  this  was  all  that  troubled  him ; 
moreover,  it  might  cause  disagreeables  between  his 
parent  and  the  duke.  Had  not  the  elder  Schiller 
sworn  that  his  son  should  stay  in  the  WUrtemberg 
service  ?     If  Karl  Eugene  did  not  exact  payment  for 


I02  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

the  eight  years'  luaintenance  at  the  academy,  there 
was  yet  fear  that  he  might  withdraw  his  favour. 
Moreover,  Schiller  had  made  debts  in  Stuttgart;  the 
creditors,  in  especial  a  Captain  von  Schade  and  Madame 
von  HoU,  w^ould  assuredly  come  down  upon  his  father 
for  payment. 

Despite  all  that  troubled  him,  he  ceased  not  to  work 
at  "  Fiesco."  While  escaping,  it  was  just  this  play 
that  proved  his  first  means  of  help.  Unfortunately, 
Dalberg  gave  him  no  answer  whatever.  His  last  re- 
source was  to  try  and  remain  in  Stuttgart.  He  there- 
fore petitioned  the  duke  for  a  mitigation  of  sentence. 
His  writings  had  hitherto  brought  him  in  an  annual 
sum  of  550  gulden,  and,  if  deprived  of  this  means  of 
income,  it  would  be  impossible  for  him  systematically 
to  continue  his  course  of  study,  or  rightly  to  reach  the 
end  that  he  had  in  view.  Some  of  his  hterary  efforts,  as 
he  was  humbly  prepared  to  show,  had  met  with  gen- 
eral acceptance  and  approval  throughout  all  Germany. 
Of  all  the  academy  pupils,  he  could  boast  to  be  the 
first  who  had  drawn  upon  him  the  notice  of  the  world, 
who  had  wrung  from  it  some  meed  of  regard.  Such 
honour  reflected  wholly  and  entirely  upon  him  to 
whom  he  owed  his  training.  He  was  ready  publicly 
to  give  account  for  any  undue  literary  license  that  he 
had  taken,  and  he  made  solemn  promise  that  all  his 
future  writings  should  undergo  strict  revision.  It  was 
hardly  conceivable  that  the  duke  would  consent  to 
this  request.  He  would  assuredly  hear  nothing  about 
a  poet,  educated,  forsooth,  at  his  military  academy ; 
again,  it  would  hardly  please  him  to  know  that  his 
army  surgeon  could  not  live  upon  his  pay.  But  the 
answer  was  other  than  Schiller  had  expected.  "  The 
Anointed  One "  went  so  far  as  to  refuse  to  accept 
the  petition,  and  General  Aug^  was  instructed  to  forbid 
Schiller,  on  pain  of  arrest,  to  address  any  further  letter 
to  his  Grace.     Flight,  that  was  the  only  remedy  left 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  103 

to  him ;  for  this  it  remained  to  choose  a  fitting  time. 
An  opportunity  offered  itself  during  the  festivities  that 
took  place  on  the  17th,  in  honour  of  Prince  Paul  of 
Russia  and  his  wife,  Maria  Feodorowna,  the  duke's 
niece.  During  the  last  days,  while  brooding  over  his 
desperate  resolve,  he  paid  a  farewell  visit  to  Schubart, 
still  a  prisoner  at  the  Asberg,  who  gave  him  several  of 
his  manuscript  poems.  Streicher  had  offered  to  ac- 
company him  in  his  flight.  It  was  he  who,  through 
love  for  Schiller,  hastened  on  his  own  journey  to 
Hamburg,  fixed  for  the  coming  spring,  when  he  was 
to  visit  Karl  Emmanuel  Bach,  the  musical  director 
there. 

Dalberg  was  among  the  duke's  guests.  He  and 
Schiller  met,  but  neither  came  to  any  nearer  explana- 
tion. With  Frau  Meyer,  the  actor's  wife,  and  Streicher 
he  went  one  afternoon  to  Solitude,  to  take  leave  of 
mother  and  sister,  who  already  knew  of  his  inevitable 
resolve.  This  was  on  the  21st,  the  day  before  that 
fixed  for  his  escape.  Next  night  a  brilliant  fete  was 
to  be  held  at  Solitude,  and  the  duke  and  his  high-born 
guests  would  grace  it  by  their  presence.  Schiller  felt 
bitterly  the  grief  of  parting.  For  over  an  hour  he 
stayed  with  his  mother,  who  was  nigh  heart-broken  at 
the  threatened  loss  of  her  only  son.  At  length  in 
deep  emotion,  and  with  eyes  reddened  by  weeping, 
he  came  back.  His  father,  noticing  their  condition, 
was  told  that  it  was  due  to  a  malady  from  which  he 
often  suffered.  The  elder  Schiller  could  talk  of 
nothing  but  of  the  rejoicings  to  take  place  upon  the 
morrow.  That  night  Schiller  stopped  at  the  guard- 
house with  S  char  ff en  stein,  whose  turn  it  was  for  duty. 
At  parting  he  commended  Lempp,  another  old  school- 
fellow, to  the  lieutenant's  care.  On  this  same  even- 
ing "  The  Robbers  "  was  being  acted  for  the  first  time 
at  Hamburg,  to  a  crowded  house ;  in  Leipzig,  too,  it 
had  been  given  with  great  success.     Early  next  morn- 


104  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

ing  he  went  his  hospital  rounds  for  the  last  time.  By- 
ten  o'clock  all  was  to  be  got  in  readiness  for  the 
journey,  and  Streicher  accordingly  came  to  him  at 
this  hour.  He  found  him  engaged  upon  an  ode,  a 
counterpart  to  one  of  Klopstock's,  that  had  for  long 
past  fascinated  him.  Wliilst  packing  away  the  vol- 
ume, it  had  worked  with  fresh  force  upon  his  mind. 
Probably  this  was  the  ode  "  Our  Princes."  Streicher 
had  to  hear  both  poems,  and  give  judgment  upon 
them.  In  imagmtive  beauty,  in  a  verbal  charm,  Schil- 
ler's work  seemed  to  him  finer.  It  needed  all  Streicher's 
care  and  forethought  to  keep  the  poet  from  leaving 
anything  that  was  necessary  behind.  In  the  evening, 
at  nine  o'clock,  as  already  the  castle-panes  blazed  with 
a  thousand  Hghts,  the  fugitive  met  his  friend.  Under 
his  cloak  he  carried  two  pistols,  both  of  them  old  and 
useless.  One  of  these  they  packed  up;  the  other, 
broken-locked  but  still  possessing  a  flint,  was  put  in 
the  carriage  that  already  held  two  boxes  and  a  small 
harpsichord.  Schiller  had  only  twenty-three  gulden 
in  cash ;  and  Streicher's  mother  in  such  haste  had 
not  been  able  to  collect  for  him  more  than  twenty- 
eight.  They  drove  out  through  the  gloomy  EszHngen 
gate,  where  Scharffenstein  was  on  guard.  To  the 
inquiring  sentry  Schiller  gave  the  names  of  Doctor 
liitter  and  Doctor  "Wolf,  both  travelling  to  Eszhngen. 
By  midnight  the  hghts  of  Solitude  could  still  be  seen, 
and  Schiller  turned  to  show  his  friend  the  point  where 
lay  his  home ;  then  there  broke  from  him  the  sigh, 
"  My  mother !  oh,  my  mother !  "  Wliile  halting  at 
Entzweihingen,  he  read  Streicher  the  MS.  poems  that 
Schubart  had  given  to  him,  among  others  "  The  Vault 
of  Princes."  At  eight  o'clock  they  reached  the  frontier, 
where  Schiller  felt  as  though  freed  from  a  crushing 
load.  Wlirtemberg  lay  behind  him  —  Wiirtemberg, 
his  fatherland,  his  prison.  "  See,"  cried  he  to  Streicher, 
"  see  how  pleasant  the  posts  and  rails  look,  in  their 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  105 

blue  and  white  paint.  The  soul  of  government  has 
just  such  pleasantness."  In  sooth,  he  knew  notliing 
of  the  hardship  to  which  he  was  going,  nor  with  what 
grief  he  would  soon  be  leaving  the  fair  land  that  he 
had  just  reached.  He  could  not  foresee  that  eleven 
years  must  pass  ere  he  should  again  set  foot  in  his 
fatherland,  ere  he  should  come  back  to  it,  broken  in 
health,  and  with  a  loving  wife  at  his  side. 


Book    IV. 

The  Fugitive 


CHAPTEK   I. 

FKOM   SEPTEMBER    TO    DECEMBER,    1782. 

The  carriage  had  only  been  hired  as  far  as  Bretten. 
Thence  they  travelled  by  mail-coach,  and  reached 
Schwetzingen  at  nine  p.  m.,  where  they  had  to  stop  the 
night,  as  Mannheim,  being  a  fortified  town,  shut  its 
gates  at  an  early  hour.  Next  morning  the  friends 
drove  thither,  gay  and  joyous  of  heart ;  for  with  them 
they  brought  "  Fiesco,"  now  all  but  completed.  They 
at  once  called  upon  Meyer,  the  regisseur.  He  was 
much  astonished  to  see  Schiller  before  him  in  the 
character  of  a  runaway,  and  courteously  invited  him 
and  his  companion  to  dinner.  After  the  meal  Schiller 
wrote  a  letter  to  the  duke,  in  which  he  repeated  the 
plea  that  before  had  been  refused  acceptance.  Dread 
of  punishment  if  he  did  this  in  Stuttgart  had  forced 
him  to  flee,  albeit  he  was  convinced  that,  might  he 
but  humbly  state  his  case,  the  heart  of  his  ruler 
would  soften  toward  him.  All  his  hopes,  all  his  pros- 
pects would  be  dashed  by  denial,  "if  he  might  not 
come  back  to  his  regiment  with  leave  to  devote  him- 
self to  literature,  so  that  with  the  profits  derived  there- 
from he  could  travel  at  times  and  gain  knowledge  of 
the  world  and  of  its  great  men  ;  moreover,  civilian's 
dress  would  be  helpful  to  him  in  his  profession. 
Otherwise  he  would  be  the  most  wretched  of  men, 
driven,  banished  from  kindred  and  home ;  he  must 
needs  wander  forth  into  the  world,  an  outcast ! "  This 
letter  he  sent  to  his  father's  friend  Colonel  von  Seeger, 

109 


no  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

who  was  to  use  his  iufluence  in  his  favour.  The 
answer  was  to  be  forwarded  to  him  at  Mayer's  address. 
Schiller  saw  no  other  means  to  postpone  being  tracked 
as  a  deserter,  but  he  could  hardly  hope  that  the  duke 
would  grant  his  wish. 

Meyer  took  rooms  hard  by  for  the  friends ;  and 
next  day  his  wife  returned  from  Stuttgart  with  the 
news  that  Schiller's  disappearance  had  instantly  be- 
come known,  and  that  there  was  general  talk  of  pur- 
suit and  capture.  By  a  strange  irony  of  fate,  the  piece 
played  before  tlie  distmguished  guests  at  Solitude  on 
the  night  of  Schiller's  escape  had  been  "  Will-o'-the- 
Wisp."  Schiller  thought  to  have  warded  off  all  danger 
by  his  one  letter ;  however,  he  wrote  a  second,  to  his 
father,  pointing  out  the  necessity  there  had  been  for 
such  a  step,  and  asking  to  be  informed  of  all  that  he 
might  have  heard  about  it. 

Soon  Seeger's  answer  arrived.  The  duke,  whom  the 
visit  of  his  high-born  relatives  had  made  specially 
gracious,  desired  him  immediately  to  return.  The 
most  to  be  looked  for  from  this  was  a  possible  exemp- 
tion from  punishment ;  Schiller  therefore  declared  that, 
without  some  further  parley,  he  could  not  come  back. 
He  also  made  appeal  to  his  general  and  other  friends, 
although  by  this  time  all  chance  of  compromise  had 
vanished.  "  Fiesco,"  that  was  his  only  hope.  At  four 
o'clock  one  afternoon,  seated  at  Meyer's  round  table,  he 
began  to  read  the  play  aloud  to  an  eager  audience  of 
actors,  saying  beforehand  a  few  introductory  words  upon 
the  history  of  the  time  and  of  the  dramatis  personam. 
He  was  listened  to  coldly  and  in  silence.  Beil  left  the 
room  after  the  first  act ;  at  the  close  of  the  second  all 
except  Iffland  followed  his  example.  Schiller  ceased 
reading  further.  Such  a  reception  of  his  piece  —  it 
had  hardly  provoked  a  single  formal  compliment  — 
quite  stunned  him.  Meyer  took  Streicher  aside  into 
another  room,  where  he  told  him    that  he  thought 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  iix 

"  Fiesco "  the  very  worst  play  to  which  he  had  ever 
listened ;  and  he  expressed  his  belief  that  Schiller 
must  have  exhausted  his  entire  powers  in  writing  "  The 
Robbers,"  and  that  hereafter  he  would  but  produce 
high-flown,  nonsensical  rubbish.  Ifflaud  stayed  till 
eight  o'clock,  but  all  conversation  on  the  subject 
flagged.  Meyer,  before  they  separated,  out  of  courtesy 
asked  Schiller  to  lend  him  the  manuscript  until  next 
morning,  as  he  had  only  heard  the  first  two  acts.  On 
reaching  his  lodging,  the  poet's  chagrin  vented  itself 
in  bitter  complaint,  touching  the  envy  of  actors  and 
their  silly  spirit  of  clique ;  in  his  despair  he  even 
thought  of  treading  the  boards  himself,  if  his  play 
were  not  accepted ;  for,  in  sooth,  they  could  none  of 
them  declaim  it  like  himself.  How  terrible  a  night, 
this  one,  for  the  poor  fugitive !  Streicher,  at  early 
morning,  while  Schiller  still  slept,  went  to  Meyer,  who 
received  him  with  the  joyful  news  that  "  Fiesco  "  was 
a  masterpiece.  It  had  been  Schiller's  provincial  ac- 
cent, his  detestable  trick  of  reading  everything,  even 
the  stage  directions,  in  the  same  higli-pitched  singsong 
voice,  it  had  been  this  that  had  damned  the  piece,  and 
had  made  one  think  it  so  thoroughly  execrable.  The 
so-called  committee  would  at  once  give  it  a  second 
hearing  and  it  should  be  put  upon  the  stage  without 
delay.  Dal  berg,  unluckily,  was  still  at  Stuttgart. 
The  fetes  were  over,  the  great  guests  had  gone,  yet  he 
sent  no  news  of  his  return ;  it  seemed  as  though  he 
wished  to  absent  himself  until  Schiller  should  have 
quitted  Mannheim.  As  without  Dalberg,  no  decision 
upon  the  play  could  be  given,  and  as  it  was  feared 
that  the  duke  would  insist  upon  his  being  given  up 
to  him,  Schiller,  following  his  friend's  advice,  resolved 
in  the  early  part  of  October  to  visit  Frankfort,  and 
while  there  it  would  be  seen  if  there  were  still  any 
danger ;  Dalberg's  verdict  would  by  that  time  also 
have  been  pronounced. 


112  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Tlie  two  friends,  musician  and  poet,  owing  to  their 
narrow  means  had  to  make  their  journey  upon  foot. 
Streicher  wrote,  before  starting,  to  his  mother,  bidding 
her  to  send  him  some  money,  addressed  to  Frankfort, 
as  he  could  not  forsake  his  friend  in  the  hour  of  need. 
One  fine  afternoon  they  crossed  the  Neckar  bridge  to 
go  toward  Sandhofen  ;  the  village  where  they  stopped 
for  the  night  was  probably  Sandtorf.  Already,  while 
on  this  journey,  a  new  theme  for  dramatic  treatment 
suggested  itself  to  Schiller  —  a  tragedy  of  bourgeois 
life  in  contrast  to,  and  with  more  of  background  in  it 
than  those  of  H.  L.  Wagner.  He  began  to  sketch  the 
first  outlines  of  his  "  Luise  Miller."  All  next  day  he 
thought  upon  this  while  passing  along  the  beautiful 
route  across  the  mountains ;  he  had  but  half  an  eye 
for  the  charms  of  landscape  that  from  time  to  time  his 
friend  sought  to  make  him  notice.  After  twelve  hours 
on  foot,  they  reached  Darmstadt  at  six  in  the  evening. 
Schiller,  next  day,  felt  somewhat  unwell ;  yet  he  re- 
solved to  push  on  to  Frankfort.  From  there  he  meant 
to  write  to  Dalberg.  At  one  village  they  drank 
"  kirschwasser "  to  strengthen  them ;  at  another  they 
tried,  though  in  vain,  to  get  some  rest.  Schiller's  faint- 
ness  and  exhaustion  increased,  and  he  at  last  lay  down 
in  a  coppice  near  the  roadside.  Here  he  fell  asleep. 
A  passer-by  asked  them  who  they  were.  Streicher  took 
the  man  for  a  recruiting  officer,  and  answered  roughly, 
"  Travellers."  His  voice  roused  Schiller,  who,  thus 
startled,  gave  the  stranger  so  searching  a  look  that, 
without  a  word,  he  turned  away  and  went  on.  This 
rest  helped  the  poet  to  reach  Sachsenhauseu,  the  suburb 
of  Frankfort,  without  difficulty.  They  took  humble 
lodging  at  an  inn  on  the  Mainbrucke,  to  the  sign  of 
the  "Three  Oxen,"  and  made  arrangements  with  the 
landlord  to  board  there  so  long  as  their  little  money 
should  last.  Early  next  day  Schiller,  in  his  sorrow, 
wrote  to  Dalberg.     Driven  by  the  duke  to  such  sudden 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  113 

flight,  he  had  been  forced  to  leave  debts  behind  him 
in   Stuttgart,  and  to  come  away  without  money  suffi- 
cient for  his  needs.     In  three  weeks  he  hoped  to  have 
"  Fiesco  "  ready  and  fit  for  the  stage.    This  emboldened 
him  to  ask  for  a  partial  advance  of  the  sum  due  to 
him,  of  which,  more  than  ever  before  in  his  hfe,  he 
stood   in  need.     He  owed  about  two  hundred  gulden 
in  Stuttgart,  and  this  caused  liim  the  greatest  anxiety. 
If  Dalberg  could  kindly  lend  him  for  a  time  a  hundred 
gulden,  it  would  be  of  the  utmost  assistance  to  him. 
Speedy  help,  that  was  all  of  which  he  thought,  for 
which  he  wished.     Having  hghtened  his  heart  of  this, 
to  him,  specially  painful  task,  his  gaiety  and  fire  re- 
turned.    The  stir  and  movement  of  a  great  commer- 
cial city  had  good  effect  upon  his   spirits.     Now  he 
could  more  entirely  devote  himself  to  his  "  Luise  Mil- 
ler."    He  withdrew  quite,  as  it  were,  within  his  shell ; 
and    Streicher,  knowing   his   habit,   left   him   to   his 
thoughts,  undisturbed.     Next  morning,  during  a  stroll 
through  the  town,  they  went  into  a  bookshop  to  ask 
for  a  copy  of  "  The  Eobbers."     Wlien  the  bookseller 
spoke  of  the  wide  fame  which  the  play  had  gained, 
Schiller,  in  the  fulness  of  his  heart,  confessed  to  being 
its  author.     He  gave  up  that  afternoon  and  evening  to 
his  new  drama ;  after  supper  he  told  Streicher  how  he 
was  now  at  work  upon  a  tragedy  of  bourgeois  life ;  he 
was  going  to  try  if  he  could  lower  himself  to  such  a 
level.     All  the  next  day  was  spent  in  writing.     On 
the  following  morning  a  letter  from  Meyer  brought  the 
crushing  news  that   Dalberg  refused  to  advance  any 
money.     The  piece  in  its  existing  form  was  of  no  ser- 
vice to  him ;  until  it  had  been  altered  he  could  say 
nothing  definite  in  the  matter.     Schiller's  only  fee  for 
"  The  Robbers  "  had  been  his  travelling  expenses  ;  yet 
the  play's  success  was  a  lasting  one.     But  no  thought 
of   helping   the    need-stricken,  despairing   poet    for  a 
moment  crossed  the  mind  of  his  Excellency  von  Dal- 


114  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

berg.  Schiller  was  too  proud  to  complain  of  such  treat- 
ment, bitterly  though  it  pained  him  to  have  been  led 
to  trust  to  the  cold-blooded  courtier's  sense  of  human- 
ity, and  to  open  out  to  him,  unchecked,  all  the  anguish 
at  his  heart.  He  quickly  determined  to  return  to  the 
environs  of  Mannheim,  in  order  to  get  his  piece  ready 
for  the  stage;  they  had  only  to  wait  for  the  money 
expected  from  Streicher's  mother.  Meantime  Schiller 
would  try  and  sell  his  poem  "  Love,  the  Devil,"  that  he 
had  brought  away  among  his  MSS.,  and  which  both  he 
and  his  friend  considered  exceptionally  good.  The 
work  has  been  lost  to  us ;  probably  it  was  based  on  a 
translation  by  Meyer  of  Cazotte's  "  Diable  Boiteux." 
Instead,  however,  of  the  twenty-five  gulden  that  he 
asked,  the  publisher  would  only  give  eighteen ;  so 
Schiller,  vexed  at  such  niggardliness,  refused  to  sell  it 
at  all,  though  sorely  in  want  of  the  money.  Streich- 
er's thirty  gulden  came  by  the  next  day's  post ;  they 
were  for  his  journey  to  Hamburg.  How,  though,  could 
he  leave  his  friend  when  in  such  a  plight  ?  With  this 
sum,  all  insufficient  for  two,  they  began  travelling  home- 
wards. They  reach  Mainz  by  boat,  going  thence  on 
foot  to  Worms.  But  Schiller  became  so  exhausted 
that  it  was  necessary  to  drive  for  a  part  of  the  distance. 
At  Worms  he  got  a  letter  from  Meyer,  promising  to 
meet  him  at  an  inn  at  Oggersheim,  a  village  near  Mann- 
heim. Here  Schiller  found  him,  with  his  wife  and 
two  friends,  admirers  of  the  poet.  The  acceptance  of 
"  Fiesco  "  was  certain,  Meyer  said,  if  it  underwent  altera- 
tion, aud  if  an  effective  ending  were  added.  To  do 
this  three  weeks  were  necessary,  Schiller  thought;  so 
Meyer  advised  him  to  share  lodging  with  Streicher  at 
the  Oggersheim  Inn.  They  accordingly  hired  a  room 
in  the  top  story.  As  in  letters  from  Stuttgart  there 
was  still  talk  of  arrest,  he  sought  to  avoid  detection  by 
calling  himself  Doctor  Schmidt.  His  new  subject 
"  Luise  Miller "  so  fascinated  him  that  he  worked  at 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  115 

that  instead  of  at  the  much-needed  "Fiesco;"  some 
of  the  characters  in  the  former  drama  were  designed 
to  suit  certain  of  the  Mannheim  actors.  The  hours  of 
twilight,  when  he  paced  the  room,  and  Streicher  sat 
playing  at  the  piano  —  these  were  the  ones  most  fa- 
vourable to  poetic  inspiration.  He  sent  several  letters 
to  Stuttgart  and  to  Solitude ;  to  foil  inquiry  he  dated 
them  from  Leipzig.  Even  his  parents  and  sister  must 
believe  him  to  be  far  away.  He  needed  nothing,  so  he 
wrote ;  he  would  pay  his  debts  as  soon  as  an  under- 
standing were  come  to  with  the  duke.  If  he  did  not 
return,  they  might  sell  his  things  and  pay  off  his  debt 
to  Landau.  He  often  went  out  at  nightfall  to  the 
town,  where  he  visited  Schwan  and  Meyer,  sometimes 
stopping  there  till  morning.  On  these  occasions  he 
used  to  lodge  with  a  builder  named  Holzel.  No  sense 
of  any  danger  troubled  him,  though  the  duke  had  sent 
him  strict  injunction  to  return.  Not  until  after  a 
fortnight,  when  "  Luise  Miller"  was  all  but  entirely 
planned  out,  did  he  busy  himself  with  ■'  Fiesco,"  which 
he  sent  to  Dalberg  the  second  week  in  November.  On 
the  6th  he  told  his  sister  he  was  en  route  for  Berlin. 
Success  was  certain,  for  he  had  an  introduction  to 
Nicolai,  the  publisher  there.  To  soothe  his  father  he 
puts  in  that  in  less  than  six  months  he  expects  to  get 
his  medical  degree.  Ere  finding  fortune  he  must  be 
quit  of  debt;  this  was  his  first  duty.  He  also  hints 
at  the  possibility  of  a  visit  to  St.  Petersburg.  He 
had  to  wait  long  for  Dalberg's  answer,  and  this  year 
his  birthday  was  passed  amid  deep  anxiety.  Kind- 
hearted  Streicher  wrote  for'  the  last  instalment  of  the 
money  intended  for  his  journey  to  Hamburg.  On  the 
16th  Schiller  complained  to  Dalberg  that  eight  days 
were  over,  yet  he  had  got  no  reply  so  far ;  if  no  decision 
could  as  yet  be  given,  he  would  like,  at  least,  to  have 
his  opinion.  Going  one  evening  to  Meyer,  he  found 
both  him  and  his  wife  in  great  consternation.     Shortly 


ii6  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

before,  a  Wiirtemberg  officer  had  called  at  the  house 
askiug  for  Schiller.  They  suspected  that  he  was  a 
messenger  from  the  duke,  and  their  fears  were  height- 
ened by  the  statements  of  other  neighbours,  who 
brought  news  that  this  officer  had  continued  his  in- 
quiries at  a  coffee-house  near  by.  Schiller  caught 
the  prevailing  panic,  and  accepted  Madame  Curioni's 
friendly  offer  to  give  him  and  Streicher  hiding  in  the 
Prince  of  Baden's  palace,  of  which  she  had  the  guard- 
ianship. Next  morning,  however,  Meyer  found  out 
that  the  stranger  had  left  Mannheim  on  the  preceding 
evening ;  he  had  come  on  no  errand  of  search ;  he  was 
a  Lieutenant  Koseritz,  one  of  Schiller's  friends,  who 
wanted  to  see  him.  Still,  it  was  evident  that  he  ran 
much  risk  by  staying  in  Mannheim,  and  as  soon  as 
"  Fiesco  "  should  be  accepted,  his  friends  advised  him 
to  quit  the  place.  He  therefore  wrote  to  Frau  von 
Wolzogen,  asking  leave  to  make  her  house  at  Bauer- 
bach  a  refuge,  although  in  Meiningen  he  could  have 
lived  in  equal  safety,  and  with  greater  ease.  What  he 
wanted  was  to  work  on  quietly  and  undisturbed,  wliile 
gaining  for  himself  fresh  ties.  The  close  of  the  month 
brought  Dalberg's  answer,  as  curt  as  it  was  pitiable. 
The  tragedy,  he  said,  was  useless  in  its  present  shape ; 
therefore  he  could  neither  accept  it  nor  offer  any  sum 
for  it.  On  the  27th  Iffland  had  given  detailed  criti- 
cism of  the  piece ;  and,  while  instancing  its  faults,  he 
pointed  out  its  high  poetical  worth,  and  the  rare  power 
of  many  of  its  scenes.  Considering  the  author's  strait- 
ened circumstances,  he  recommended  that  he  should 
at  least  be  paid  a  sum  equal  to  that  ordinarily  given 
for  hack  work,  or  for  translations  of  the  common  stamp. 
Despite  such  advice,  this  almighty  magnate  of  the 
stage  —  he  who  well  knew  of  Schiller's  straits  — 
decreed  that  no  sum  could  be  offered  for  his  play.  Per- 
haps this  was  quite  in  the  baronial  manner ;  neverthe- 
less, it  was  hardly  humane.     His  Excellency  could  not 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  117 

risk  the  loss  of  a  duke's  favour ;  rather  than  forego  it, 
a  genius  might  starve !  Time  has  veiled  from  us 
many  an  act  no  whit  less  mean ;  we  have  to  thank  the 
Nemesis  of  history  for  hiding  much  of  Dalberg's  base- 
ness ;  yet  we  can  never  forget  that  it  was  he  who  left 
a  poet  to  struggle  on  in  penury,  rather  than  lose  the 
enjoyment  gained  by  attendance  at  grand-ducal  fetes. 
Schiller's  only  alternative  was  to  offer  his  play  to 
Schwan,  the  pubhsher.  He,  poor  man,  was  sorry  not 
to  be  able  to  give  more  than  a  louis  d'or  per  sheet ;  but 
at  least  he  paid  him  this  modest  fee  in  advance,  for 
ten  sheets  to  begin  with,  as  it  was  uncertain  how  many 
there  might  be  in  all.  Schwan  treated  him  like  a 
friend ;  he  gave  him  introductions  to  Ettinger,  another 
publisher  at  Gotha.  Schiller  was  forced  to  pawn  his 
watch,  and  after  buying  some  of  the  barest  necessaries, 
he  had  just  enough  left  for  his  journey,  and  for  the 
defrayal  of  expenses  at  Oggersheim.  They  w^ere  to 
leave  that  place  at  the  beginning  of  December.  When 
Meyer  and  other  friends  came  to  bear  him  company  as 
far  as  Worms,  they  found  him  in  the  act  of  packing 
his  portmanteau ;  matters  of  most  urgency  were  forth- 
with discussed  over  a  bottle  of  wine.  At  the  post- 
house  at  Worms  they  saw  a  strolling  company  play, 
in  execrable  fashion,  Gerstenberg  and  Benda's  "  Ariadne 
in  Naxos."  The  others  found  this  a  rich  theme  for 
laughter;  but  Schiller  watched  the  performance  with 
deep  earnestness.  Not  until  supper-time,  when  Ehen- 
ish  wine  went  round,  did  he  get  back  his  spirits.  Meyer 
and  his  friends  were  profuse  in  farewell  wishes ;  but 
Schiller  and  his  Pylades  could  say  nothing  —  no  kiss, 
no  embrace,  only  a  lengthened  pressure  of  the  hand  set 
seal  upon  the  bond  of  friendship  between  two  faithful 
hearts.  All  honour  and  eternal  gratitude  be  to  Streicher, 
that  true  and  sterling  soul  before  whom  Dalberg's 
baronial  lustre  pales !  With  little  clothing  to  ward 
off  the  cold  of  that  winter  night,  Schiller  stepped  into 


n8  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  post-chaise  which  was  to  take  him  to  Meiningeu. 
Besides  Streicher  there  was  but  one  of  Schiller's  friends 
who  could  fully  appreciate  this  act  of  his,  this  forcible 
self-severance  from  all  the  ties  that  bound  him.  It 
was  Iffland,  whom  passion  for  his  art  had  driven  to  the 
boards,  who,  while  yet  a  mere  boy  of  eighteen,  had 
chosen  to  forsake  the  comforts  of  family  and  home  — 
he  it  was  who,  in  Schiller's  flight,  discerned  the  resist- 
less might  of  genius. 


CHAPTER  II. 

FROM  DECEMBER,  1782,  TO  JULY,  1783. 

Schiller  reached  Meiningen  on  the  morning  of 
December  7th.  He  halted  at  the  "  Stag  "  there  —  an 
inn  still  in  existence  —  whence  he  at  once  wrote  to  the 
sub-librarian,  Reinwald,  to  whom  Frau  von  Wolzogen 
had  given  him  recommendation.  He  said  that  a  trav- 
eller from  Stuttgart,  whom,  perhaps,  he  knew,  was 
anxious  for  the  pleasure  of  an  interview.  Fears  for 
personal  safety  obliged  him  to  maintain  an  incognito, 
but  he  begged  for  the  pleasure  of  his  company  at 
dinner.  Wilhelm  Friedrich  Hermann  Reinwald,  whose 
father  held  a  post  under  government  at  Meiningen,  was 
at  this  time  in  his  forty-sixth  year.  He  had  studied 
law;  but  likewise  took  keen  interest  in  music,  phi- 
lology, and  helles  lettres.  The  death  of  Duke  Anton 
Ulrich,  who  had  sent  him  as  privy  councillor  to 
Vienna,  robbed  him  of  the  prospect  of  a  successful 
future.  All  higher  outlook  vanished  in  his  acceptance 
of  a  paltry  secretaryship.  In  1776  he  undertook  the 
management  of  the  ducal  hbrary,  then  in  a  state  of 
thorough  disorder.  Overwork,  and  residence  in  chilly, 
unheated  rooms,  affected  his  eyes  and  broke  his  health, 
thus  heightening  the  melancholy  from  which  he  already 
suffered.  When,  after  four  years,  his  arduous  task  was 
ended,  another  was  preferred  before  him.  The  head 
librarianship  was  given  to  one  Walch.  Yet,  though 
thus  slighted,  he  continued  to  devote  himself,  heart 
and  soul,  to  the  library  under  his  care.     He  cherished 

119 


I20  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

deep  sympathy  for  art  and  science ;  he  had  published 
several  poems  and  essays ;  and  a  volume  from  his  pen, 
"  Poetic  Fancies,  Tales,  Letters,  and  Miscellanea,"  had 
just  appeared.  To  render  a  service  to  the  author  of 
"  The  Robbers,"  and  to  Frau  von  Wolzogen,  gave  him 
great  pleasure. 

Shortly  ere  nightfall  Schiller  reached  the  little  vil- 
lage of  Bauerbach,  lying  to  the  south  of  Meiningen, 
amid  dark,  pine-clad  hills  that  part  the  rivers  Werra 
and  Main.  It  was  a  mere  hamlet  of  some  thirty 
houses,  and  Jews  formed  a  third  of  the  population. 
With  its  ruined  church,  it  belonged  to  the  neighbour- 
ing parish  of  Bibra.  Snow  had  fallen,  and  all  was 
wrapped  in  white,  while  here  and  there  from  the 
scattered  houses  lights  gleamed.  Schiller  was  taken  to 
the  local  justice,  who  already  had  knowledge  of  his 
coming.  He  welcomed  the  poet,  introduced  as  Doctor 
Ritter,  with  much  cordiality,  and  brought  him  to  the 
baroness's  house,  that  stood  close  by,  a  plain  building, 
with  spacious  grounds.  Up-stairs  he  found  a  large 
stove  alight,  and  all  in  readiness  for  his  arrival.  Even 
now  one  may  see  in  that  low-roofed  room  the  identical 
chair  which  was  put  at  the  fugitive's  disposal ;  there, 
too,  is  the.  round  table  at  which  he  wrote ;  there,  too, 
the  old  family  portraits  that  looked  down  gravely  at 
him  from  their  frames.  The  villagers  were  but  poor 
peasant-folk,  who  earned  a  livelihood  by  husbandry 
and  tar-burning.  In  the  loneliness  to  which  he  soon 
grew  accustomed,  all  that  he  needed  was  a  friend  — 
some  one  of  culture  with  whom  to  exchange  sympa- 
thies and  thoughts.  At  first  the  bad  weather  kept 
him  indoors ;  and  there  he  merely  met  servants,  and 
occasionally  the  local  justice,  who,  for  private  ends, 
treated  his  tenant's  guest  with  profuse  civility.  Later 
on  he  made  acquaintance  with  the  vicar  of  Bibra  and 
his  son,  both  men  of  high  education. 

He   first   endeavoured,  although  vainly,  to   get  his 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  121 

"  Fiesco  "  printed.  "  You  know,"  writes  he  to  Schwan 
on  the  8th,  "  you  know  that  it  was  but  the  prohibition 
to  follow  literature  which  drove  me  from  the  Wiirtem- 
berg  service.  If,  therefore,  in  this  field  I  do  not  soon 
let  the  land  hear  my  voice,  it  will  be  thought  that  the 
step  I  took  was  without  purpose,  and  in  vain.  Pray 
urge  on  the  printing  as  soon  as  you  can.  In  a  fort- 
night you  shall  have  postscript  and  preface."  He 
further  adds  that,  for  a  speedier  settlement  of  his 
affairs,  he  must  that  winter  take  to  poetry ;  afterward 
he  would  sink  himself  in  the  study  of  medicine  —  in 
his  profession.  Toward  gaining  his  own  livelihood, 
toward  reaUsing  the  hopes  placed  in  him  by  his  family, 
it  seemed  best  to  do  this ;  yet  genius  swept  him 
forward  along  her  path.  His  heart  was  heavy  on 
Streicher's  account ;  alas !  he  could  do  nothing  but 
recommend  him  to  Schwan.  Besides  the  new  piece 
that  he  soon  hoped  to  finish,  there  were  other  dramatic 
schemes  that  busied  him  ;  he  had  a  "  Mary  Stuart,"  a 
"  Don  Carlos  "  in  project.  Perhaps,  too,  at  this  time 
his  mind  may  have  been  at  work  upon  an  original 
theme,  upon  his  "  Friedrich  Imhof,"  in  which  Jesuitism 
is  treated  in  the  same  fashion  as  in  his  "  Ghostseer." 
Imhof  was  supposed  to  be  a  freethinker ;  thus  he  gave 
him  his  own  Christian  name.  More  likely,  however, 
the  title  was  suggested  by  the  name  of  an  old  fellow 
cadet. 

As  his  imagination  grew  ever  more  and  more  active, 
Schiller  had  need  before  all  things  of  books  whereon  to 
nourish  his  mind  ;  thus,  the  very  second  day  of  his 
arrival,  he  sent  Eeinwald  a  hst  of  works  he  wished  to 
have.  On  this,  besides  philosophical  treatises  by  Garve, 
Mendelssohn,  Smith,  and  Sulzer,  with  others  of  a  criti- 
cal and  sesthetic  nature  by  Gerard,  Home,  Lessing,  and 
Ramler,  he  had  put  down  Shakespeare's  "  Eomeo  and 
Juliet "  (a  help  to  the  last  scene  in  "  Luise  Miller  "),  Wie- 
land's  "  Agathon,"  St.  E^al's  "  History  of  Don  Carlos," 


123  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

histories  of  Scotland  and  of  England  by  Robertson  and 
Hume  (these,  perhaps,  for  "  Mary  Stuart "),  some  books 
of  travel,  and,  last  of  all,  Zimmermann  on  "  Experience 
in  Medicine."  With  his  "  Luise  Miller "  he  did  not 
make  rapid  progress ;  he  left  this  to  write  the  dedica- 
tion of  "  Fiesco  "  to  his  old  master  Abel.  It  was  a 
pleasure  in  his  dreary  loneliness,  while  pining  half 
morbidly  for  human  intercourse,  when  Keinwald  with 
some  friends  came  to  see  him.  But  his  promised  visit 
in  return  at  Christmastide  never  took  place,  as  "  he  had 
not  adequate  equipment  to  show  himself  on  Sundays 
in  the  town." 

Into  his  life  a  fair  star  now  rose  when,  at  the  New 
Year,  Frau  von  Wolzogen  brought  her  daughter  Char- 
lotte to  Bauerbach.  Now  for  the  first  time  love 
touched  his  heart  with  all  its  fire  and  force.  Perhaps 
while  still  a  schoolgirl  at  Stuttgart  she  may  have 
charmed  him ;  yet  the  feeling  then  was  no  deep  one. 
Now,  in  the  height  of  youth  and  maidenly  beauty,  she 
stood  before  the  poet's  wondering  gaze ;  he  saw  her, 
not  in  the  vortex  of  society,  but  in  the  natural  atmos- 
phere of  her  own  home.  The  thought  flashed  upon 
him  that,  having  her  companionship,  he  would  find  the 
full  meed  of  earthly  happiness.  Though  void  of  all 
prospect  of  success  in  the  future,  he  scarcely  saw  how 
vain  must  be  any  hope  of  marriage  with  a  dowerless 
lady  of  rank.  He  yearned  only  for  the  rest  that  now 
at  last  seemed  found  for  his  despairing  soul ;  this 
blinded  him  to  every  hindrance. 

On  the  3d  of  January,  1783,  he  accompanied  Frau 
von  Wolzogen  and  Lotte  to  Waldorf,  some  three 
leagues  distant,  where  her  brother  Dietrich  Marschalk 
von  Ostheim  had  an  estate.  Schiller  had  the  pleasure 
of  making  his  acquaintance,  besides  that  of  the  vicar  of 
the  parish.  In  the  afternoon  he  took  leave  of  the 
baroness,  promising  soon  to  return. 

Writing  next  day  to  her,  he  says :  "  Your  absence 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  123 

has  robbed  me  of  what  was  myself ;  my  state  is  oue 
of  mighty  transport ;  I  am  as  one  who  has  looked  long 
upon  the  sun,  which  stays  before  the  vision  long  after 
the  eyes  are  turned  therefrom ;  they  are  blind  to 
any  lesser  ray.  But  I  shall  be  careful  not  to  destroy 
the  charm  of  such  illusion."  He  only  ventures  to  send 
"sincere  regards"  to  Lotte,  besides  a  complimentary 
message  to  the  baroness's  brother.  He  had  promised 
to  write  a  letter  on  her  behalf  to  the  Duchess  of 
Goth?.,  Charlotte's  godmother,  about  school  expenses, 
and  to  compose  a  poem  anent  the  betrothal  of  her 
foster-daughter,  Heinietta  Sturm,  with  a  bailiff  at  Wal- 
dorf. In  this  last,  his  lyric  muse,  long  silent,  again 
spoke  forth,  with  new  fervour,  with  deeper  zeal.  The 
bulk  of  his  praise  falls  to  Henrietta's  foster-mother ; 
hers  was  a  nobility  of  life,  far  higher  than  that  of 
birth,  which  he  detested.  In  describing  the  bliss  that 
love  brings  to  the  heart,  he  may  have  wished  to  reveal 
to  Lotte  how  he  himself  longed  for  such  joy.  After 
his  second  visit  to  Waldorf,  he  told  his  benefactress 
the  dread  he  felt  at  their  threatened  separation. 

"  It  is  fearful,"  he  writes,  "  to  hve  apart  from  human- 
ity, without  some  sympathising  soul ;  yet  no  less  fear- 
ful is  it  to  chng  to  some  kindred  heart  from  which, 
sooner  or  later,  in  a  world  where  nothing  stands  sure, 
one  must  wrench  one's  self,  bleeding,  away." 

The  following  week  they  met  at  Meiningen,  and  then 
again  at  Waldorf  before  her  departure  on  the  24th. 
Shortly  previous  to  this,  Lotte  had  been  placed  under 
the  care  of  a  bailiffs  wife ;  later  on,  it  being  fixed  that 
she  should  go  back  to  Stuttgart  with  her  mother. 
While  she  was  here,  he  must  have  written  her  a  letter, 
which,  however,  was  opened  by  other  hands  and  with- 
held. Four  months  afterward  he  reflects  upon  the 
fate  of  his  missive.  To  mislead  all  who  might  be  on 
his  track,  he  gave  Frau  von  Wolzogeu  another  letter 
dated  from    Hanover,  in    which    he    spoke    of    going 


124  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

to  England,  perhaps  even  to  North  America,  if  that 
were  a  free  country.  To  Streicher  he  sent  the  news 
that,  on  account  of  the  duke,  the  baroness  discounte- 
nanced his  staying  longer  under  her  roof.  He  was 
therefore  going  to  Herr  von  Wurmb,  with  whom  he 
hud  become  fast  friends,  and  who  had  invited  him  to 
his  estate  in  the  Thiiringen  Forest.  He  knew  that 
many  would  ask  Streicher  about  him  ;  this,  therefore, 
seemed  the  easiest  way  to  spread  a  false  report  —  one, 
by  the  way,  that  scarcely  tallied  with  the  letter  given 
to  the  baroness. 

Although  he  was  anxious  to  finish  *'  Luise  Miller  " 
because  of  the  money  it  would  bring  him,  the  subject 
of  "  Don  Carlos  "  now  laid  mighty  gi-asp  upon  his  mind. 
Nevertheless,  Eeinwald  prevailed  upon  him  to  write, 
at  the  Duke  of  Meiningen's  suggestion,  a  satire  in 
verse  upon  the  impromptu  military  arrangements  made 
by  the  Coburg  court  when,  during  his  Grace's  illness, 
it  moved  to  Meiningen.  This  Reinwald  printed  in  the 
local  paper  —  of  course,  under  a  nom  de  plume.  "  Simon 
Crabseye,  B.  A.,"  such  was  the  signature  that  Schiller 
chose.  Then,  wonderful  to  tell,  Dalberg  turns  to 
Schiller,  whom  he  had  so  shabbily  treated,  to  ask 
what  progress  he  had  made  with  "  Luise  Miller,"  about 
which,  through  the  actors,  he  had  heard.  Schiller  had 
not  forgotten  how  arbitrarily  his  "  Fiesco "  had  been 
rejected ;  there  was  some  spice  of  scorn  in  his  answer 
to  the  effect  that  the  play  was  choked  with  errors. 
But  Dalberg,  changed  on  a  sudden  to  all  that  was 
courteous  and  bland,  wanted  to  have  the  piece  at  once ; 
nay,  its  very  faults  were  merits,  fi-om  a  dramatic  stand- 
point. Instead,  therefore,  of  continuing  "  Don  Carlos," 
Schiller  was  led  to  finish  his  other  and  earlier  play 
first,  which  he  intended  to  offer  for  publication  to  the 
well-known  firm  of  Weygand  in  Leipzig. 

The  Duke  of  Meiningen's  birthday  was  on  the  4th 
of  February,  and  to  celebrate  his  restoration  to  health, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  125 

a  little  drama  for  children  was  to  be  acted  in  his  hon- 
our on  that  day.  For  this,  Keinwald  asked  the  poet 
to  compose  either  a  prologue  or  an  epilogue.  And  he 
did  not  refuse  compliance  with  so  strange  a  request, 
albeit  that  it  obliged  him  to  leave  weightier  work 
aside.  By  writing  poetry  for  his  Grace  of  Meiningeu, 
Schiller  thought  to  ensure  that  nobleman's  protection, 
if  Karl  Eugene  should  be  told  where  he  was  hidden. 
Just  then  the  duke  was  in  Saxony.  While  at  Leipzig, 
Weygand  spoke  to  him  admiringly  of  his  liegeman,  the 
renowned  author  of  "  The  Eobbers."  For  Weygand  knew 
nothing  about  the  poet's  flight. 

Frau  von  Wolzogen  had  fixed  to  be  absent  for  four- 
teen weeks.  On  the  first  of  February  he  tells  her  of 
his  joy  that  one  of  them  is  past.  She  had  gone  hence 
with  his  good  wishes,  his  tears ;  they  would  follow  her 
everywhere.  He  is  glad  that  Lotte  can  travel  with 
her,  though,  had  she  stayed  behind,  he  would  have 
gained.  He  ardently  looks  forward  to  spending  the 
following  summer  in  their  society. 

"  So  lovely,  so  springlike  is  the  weather  to-day,"  he 
writes,  "  that  it  conjures  up  visions  of  all  that  pleasant 
time  which  is  to  come.  How  precious,  then,  must  those 
days  to  us  be  that  take  their  colouring  from  friendship. 
I  am  going  on  a  shooting  expedition  to  the  mountain 
and  the  coppice.     Perhaps  I  may  have  some  sport." 

But  all  too  soon  winter  returned,  making  every  road 
and  path  impassable.  So  irksome  to  him  was  the  soli- 
tude of  his  "  caged  cell,"  to  which  in  general  he  saw 
himself  doomed,  that  often  he  would  gladly  have  ex- 
changed it  for  the  companionship  of  some  rational 
human  being.  He  deeply  felt  that  genius  needs  a 
spur,  an  impulse  derived  from  contact  with  other 
mmds. 

"  Laboriously,  and  often  while  quite  against  the 
grain,"  says  he,  "  I  have  to  work  myself  up  into  a 
mood,  a  key  for  poetry  that  otherwise  I  could  reach 


126  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

after  ten  minutes'  intellectual  talk  with  a  friend,  after 
reading  some  excellent  book,  or  after  a  sight  of  the 
broad  heavens.  It  would  seem  that  thoughts  can  but 
be  called  forth  by  thoughts,  and  that  our  ideas,  like 
the  strings  of  some  instrument,  need  to  be  played  upon 
by  other  minds." 

He  had  undertaken  to  teach  Lotte  chess ;  while 
playing  at  times  for  practice  with  the  justice,  maybe 
he  thought  of  her  and  of  his  promise.  Just  in  these 
days  Duke  Karl  passed  near  Meiniugen  as  he  returned 
by  way  of  Gotha.  He  had  been  to  Jena  and  Weimar ; 
visiting  Goethe,  whom  he  had  already  known  at  Stutt- 
gart, yet  neglecting  to  notice  another  great  poet  of  his 
country,  Wieland. 

"  Luise  Miller  "  had  been  gleefully  accepted  by  Wey- 
gand,  though  at  the  outset  he  sought  to  profit  by  the 
poet's  good  nature.  As  the  work  could  not  be  printed 
until  Easter,  he  asked  Schiller  to  append  thereto  a 
prose  outhne  of  the  story.  But  Schiller  declined  to 
do  this.  He  promised,  however,  to  give  him  his 
"  Maria  Stuart "  when  complete,  for  which  Eeinwald 
was  getting  him  further  historical  references.  "  The 
Eobbers  "  had  been  played  at  Berlin  before  his  Majesty 
the  king  with  tumultuous  applause ;  in  one  of  the 
journals  an  ode  appeared  celebrating  the  author  as  the 
Shakespeare  of  Germany.  Meanwhile  he  made  httle 
progress  with  "  Maria  Stuart ; "  he  wavered  between 
working  at  that  or  at  his  "  Imhof ; "  and  with  Weygaud 
he  could  not  agree  about  the  payment  for  "  Luise 
IVIiller."  Then  the  news  reached  him  that  one  of  his 
old  fellow  cadets,  a  Lieutenant  von  Winkelmann,  was 
going  to  accompany  the  baroness  back  to  Meiniugen. 
He  consequently  wrote  to  her  to  express  his  keen 
regret  at  being  forced,  under  the  circumstances,  to  keep 
away,  for  if  he  came,  detection  would  be  inevitable. 
Fears  on  this  head,  however,  were  not  his  sole  motive ; 
more  probably  he  dreaded  that  in  the  lieutenant  he 


THE  LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  127 

would  find  a  successful  rival  for  the  hand  of  Char- 
lotte. 

Before  answer  came  to  this  passionate  outburst,  he 
at  length  wrote  an  answer  to  Dalberg.  He  stimulates 
his  curiosity  respecting  the  new  piece,  which  he  is 
already  arranging  to  publish,  and  throws  out  hints 
about  "  Don  Carlos "  and  a  tragedy  of  Prince  Conrad, 
leaving  him  to  judge  whether  all  his  dramatic  force 
has  failed  him.  Pressed  though  he  was  for  money, 
matters  were  left  unsettled ;  and  "  Luise  Miller,"  that 
he  had  been  all  too  eager  to  see  in  type,  was  set  aside 
for  the  "  Don  Carlos,"  which  now  mightily,  irresistibly 
absorbed  him. 

At  spring's  outset  he  had  suffered  from  an  attack 
of  vertigo ;  blood-letting  had  been  necessary.  News 
of  his  mother's  illness  also  caused  him  alarm.  He 
roamed  about  the  neighbourhood,  often  visiting  his 
clerical  friends  at  Bibra,  staying  often  until  nightfall 
to  finish  some  pleasant  discussion.  At  Untermaszfeld, 
a  village  between  Bauerbach  and  Meiningen,  he  met 
Eeinwald  and  called  upon  Easche,  the  vicar  there, 
well  known  as  a  numismatist.  At  Ritschenhausen  he 
was  also  known  to  the  clergyman  of  the  parish.  He 
grew  more  intimate  with  the  village  folk,  especially 
with  the  innkeeper.  While  looking  forward  to  the 
coming  of  his  benefactress  and  her  daughter,  he  busied 
himself  with  gardening  ;  the  summer-house  formed  a 
favourite  retreat,  and  he  also  made  a  skittle-ground. 

Meanwhile  his  slender  money  store  became  ex- 
hausted. In  his  need  he  turned  to  Eeinwald,  who  was 
greatly  sorry  that,  placed  as  he  was,  he  could  not  offer 
him  help.  Schiller  sought  to  soothe  his  distress  by 
pointing  out  that  he  was  only  in  such  sudden  straits 
owing  to  a  pecuniary  disagreement  with  Weygand,  and 
because  moneys  due  to  him  on  "  Piesco  "  and  on  a  watch 
left  behind  him  at  Mannheim  had  not  yet  been  paid. 
He  had  therefore  to  go  to  the  justice  and  borrow  of  him. 


128  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

With  the  approach  of  spring  the  poet's  breast 
glowed  with  fresher  and  more  fervent  fire.  Absorbed 
in  "  Don  Carlos,"  he  writes  on  April  14th,  while  sitting 
in  the  summer-house,  to  Ileinwald,  who,  in  the  ardour 
of  his  enthusiasm,  he  takes  to  be  the  noble-minded 
being  for  which  he  so  long  had  sought,  who  had  entire 
possession  of  him  with  all  his  failings,  all  his  shattered 
virtues.  "  I  might  perhaps  have  been  great,"  he  re- 
marks, "  but  fate  fought  against  me  all  too  soon."  As 
he  conceived  it,  all  poems  were  but  inspired  by  enthu- 
siastic friendship,  or  by  Platonic  love.  The  poet's  at- 
titude toward  his  hero  should  be  less  that  of  an  artist 
than  of  a  lover,  a  friend.  For  this  cause,  Leisewitz's 
"  Julius  von  Tarent "  had  touched  him  more  than  Les- 
sing's  "  Emilia."  And  so  "  Don  Carlos  "  was  for  him 
much  as  some  living  object  might  be  ;  it  filled  his  heart, 
his  brain ;  it  was  with  him  in  every  place,  at  every 
season.  Possessing  something  of  the  soul  of  "  Hamlet," 
his  piece  would  borrow  blood  and  nerve  from  Leise- 
witz,  while  he  himself  would  give  it  pulse  and  life. 
Through  his  description  of  the  Inquisition  and  its  in- 
iquities, he  hoped  to  avenge  the  miseries  it  had  brought 
to  suffering  humanity. 

To  his  joy  "  Fiesco  "  was  at  last  printed,  and  he  was 
very  anxious  to  see  the  early  notices  of  it.  Frau  von 
Wolzogen  set  his  mind  at  rest  about  Winkelmann's 
coming.  Leaving  his  "  Carlos "  for  awhile,  he  went 
back  to  "  Luise  Miller,"  which  he  was  desirous  to  finish, 
and  thereby  satisfy  Dalberg,  who  had  grown  clamorous. 
But  progress  was  not  as  rapid  with  it  as  he  thought ; 
he  had  in  especial  much  to  alter  in  order  to  fit  it  for 
the  stage,  and  this  enforced  haste  seemed,  as  he  said, 
"  quite  to  clip  his  wings."  Another  cause  for  uneasi- 
ness was  the  news  of  Lotte's  engagement  to  a  Herr 
von  Pfaffenrath,  a  report  which  proved  to  be  un- 
founded when  the  baroness,  according  to  promise, 
came  to  Bauerbach  about  the  20th  of  May.     On  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  129 

10th  Schiller  had  been  to  Meiningen,  principally  to 
confer  with  Reinwald  about  "  Luise  Miller."  Next 
morning,  without  bidding  him  farewell,  he  hurried 
back  to  Bauerbach;  for  it  was  on  Sunday  that  the 
baroness  would  arrive,  and  he  must  get  all  in  readiness 
to  give  her  festal  welcome.  All  literary  work  was  for 
a  time  abandoned.  He  had  much  upon  his  hands ;  for 
the  village  folk  were  a  clumsy  set,  and  he  had  to  give 
orders  and  make  every  arrangement  himself ;  but  he 
had  his  reward  in  the  pleasure  that  his  exertions  gave 
to  his  benefactress. 

Writing  to  Eeinwald,  he  says :  "  I  had  an  avenue 
of  Mayblossom  set  up,  which  reached  from  the  utmost 
end  of  the  village  until  her  house.  At  the  entrance 
was  a  triumphal  arch  made  of  pine-branches.  To  the 
sound  of  guns  the  procession  went  from  here  to  the 
church,  that  was  decorated  throughout  with  sprigs  of 
May.  We  had  some  nice  music,  with  wind-instru- 
ments, and  the  rector  of  Bibra  preached  a  sermon 
for  the  occasion,"  etc.  He  grew  now  ever  increas- 
ingly intimate  with  Frau  von  Wolzogen  and  her 
daughter ;  and  games  at  chess  with  the  latter  were 
more  and  more  to  his  taste.  The  mother  had  told 
him  frankly  about  Lotte's  romantic  relations  with 
Lieutenant  von  Winkelmann ;  he  loved  her  too  much 
to  oppose  a  match  that  might  increase  her  welfare, 
deep  though  his  own  loss  would  be.  To  her  brother, 
Wilhelm,  his  friend,  when  speaking  of  the  subject,  he 
remarked  that  he  envied  him  so  lovable  a  sister. 

"  Just  as  if  fresh  from  the  Creator's  hand,  innocent, 
and  with  a  soul  the  fairest,  gentlest,  and  most  sensitive, 
without  as  yet  a  breath  of  universal  corruption  upon 
the  spotless  mirror  of  her  mind  —  such  is  your  Lotte, 
as  I  know  her,  and  woe  betide  him  who  should  bring 
clouds  across  the  Hfe  of  one  so  guileless  !  You  may 
rely  upon  my  care  for  her  mental  culture.  I  am  only 
half-fearful  to  show  it,  because  one  so  quickly  steps 


130  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

from   respect  and  warm   sympathy  to  sentiments    of 
another  kind." 

When  Lotte  and  her  mother  went  to  Meiningen  to 
speak  about  school-money  to  the  Duchess  of  Gotha,  he 
wrote  to  the  baroness :  "  Think  that  you  are  but  hazard- 
ing a  wretched  hundred  thalers,  while  fur  yourself,  for 
Lotte,  and  also  for  me  (by  staying  oftener  in  Bauerbach), 
you  have  everything  to  win.  If  you  will  waive  all 
claim  to  the  money,  I  promise  each  year  to  write  a 
new  play  and  put  upon  the  title-page,  '  A  Tragedy  for 
Lotte.' "  Thus  did  love's  power  stir  and  heighten  his 
creative  faculties.  In  this  letter  he  enclosed  flowers 
for  Lotte.  He  grew  half-desperate  w^hen  the  baroness 
delayed  her  home-coming  for  two  days  beyond  the 
appointed  time. 

"  Oh,  best  of  friends,  when  in  an  urgent  strait  you 
have  forsaken  me !  I  have  never  needed  your  affec- 
tionate sympathy  more  than  I  do  now ;  from  far,  from 
near,  no  one  has  come  to  soothe  me  in  my  wild,  disor- 
dered frenzy.  What  shall  I,  what  can  I,  do  to  dis- 
tract my  thoughts  ?  I  know  of  nothing  but  to  write 
to  you  ;  yet,  in  my  letters,  even,  I  am  afraid  of  myself." 
Further  passages  show  the  vehemence  of  his  passion, 
that  has  quite  shaken  his  whole  existence.  Frau  von 
Wolzogen  had  told  him  that  in  Meiningen  people 
knew  who  her  friend  "  Doctor  Kitter  "  was.  The  news, 
though  without  confirmation,  deeply  agitated  him. 
He  begs  the  baroness  to  aid  him  in  tracing  the  be- 
trayer, whom  he  vows  to  hate,  though  it  were  his  best 
friend.  It  would  henceforth  be  ridiculous  to  keep  up 
his  incognito  ;  he  must  go  into  society  under  his  own 
name  and  mouth  impertinencies  to  all  the  blockheads 
who  had  thus  aspired  to  hear  him,  for  he  would  have 
to  maintain  the  respect  due  to  his  name. 

"Yet  I'm  a  fool,"  he  suddenly  jerks  out,  "for  all 
this  too  has  now  no  value  for  me.  Time  was  when  I 
was  as  greatly  tickled  with  the  prospect  of  undying 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  131 

fame  as  a  woman  is  tickled  by  some  intrigue.  Now 
'tis  all  one  to  me  ;  I  would  make  you  a  present  of  my 
laurels  in  the  next  dish  of  hceuf  a  la  mode  —  would 
let  you  have  my  tragic  muse  as  milkmaid  if  you  hap- 
pened to  keep  cows!  How  dwarfed  is  the  highest 
point  in  a  poet's  fame  when  set  against  the  prospect  of 
a  happy  life  !  "  And  then  he  quotes  Leonore's  extrava- 
gant appeal  to  Fiesco  to  fling  aside  all  that  is  vanity 
and  a  sham,  and  in  romantic  regions  lead  with  her  a 
life  of  perfect  friendship. 

"  All  my  former  plans  have  collapsed,  dearest  friend, 
and  woe  is  me  if  such  be  also  the  fate  of  my  present 
ones.  Of  course,  I  mean  to  stay  where  you  are  —  to 
be  buried,  if  it  is  possible,  near  you  !  Nor  is  there 
fear  that  I  shall  quit  you,  when  even  three  days  of 
separation  seem  to  me  so  intolerable.  The  sole  ques- 
tion is :  How  can  I,  near  you,  find  a  lasting  basis  for 
my  lifelong  prosperity  ?  And  find  this  basis  I  will, 
or  die ;  at  present  I  pit  my  heart  and  my  strength  against 
the  very  hugest  obstacles,  and  I  know  withal  that  I 
can  conquer  them." 

Although  having  re-read  his  letter,  he  is  conscious 
of  the  madness  in  it,  he  sends  it  all  the  same ;  if  his 
tongue  proclaim  him  insane,  his  pen  will  scarcely  give 
him  credit  for  greater  wisdom.  Then  he  hears  that 
some  one  from  Stuttgart  (it  was  Chamberlain  von 
Kiinsberg)  had  arrived  at  Meiningen  in  a  carriage  and 
four,  and  was  asking  for  the  baroness.  His  jealousy 
told  him  that  it  was  either  Pfaffenrath  or  Winkel- 
mann.  If  it  were  the  latter,  would  she  send  him 
instant  word  ?  For  in  that  case  he  would  go  to  Wei- 
mar. And  in  spite  of  this,  he  begs  her  to  bring  him 
Klopstock's  "  Messias,"  to  lift  him  upwards  to  clearer 
atmosphere ;  he  also  asks  for  a  copy  of  "  Ossian,"  the 
melancholy  bard.  Madame  von  Wolzogen  was  struck 
with  fear  at  passion  so  tremendous  in  its  force ;  it 
threatened  to  wreck  his  happiness  no  less  than  her 


132  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

own.  For  what  would  become  of  her  Lotte,  Hnked  to 
a  poet  whom  passion  robbed  of  all  reason,  causing  him 
to  forget  not  merely  his  own  high  calling,  for  which 
all  her  enthusiasm  had  been  roused,  but  also  to  ignore 
all  duties  to  his  family,  who  placed  their  entire  hopes 
upon  him  ?  Warnings,  exhortations  from  father  and 
sister  were  alilce  fruitless ;  he  had  written  to  them 
shortly  before  of  his  brilliant  prospects  as  a  man  of 
letters,  and  they  in  answer  urged  him  not  to  squander 
time  in  dreamy  inactivity,  being  burdensome  to  a  noble- 
woman whose  income  was  far  from  a  large  one.  Rein- 
wald,  too,  wished  Schiller  to  quit  his  benefactress,  who, 
in  her  heart's  kindness,  had  given  him  shelter ;  he 
ought  to  go  to  some  large  town,  where  there  was  a 
good  German  playhouse.  For,  said  Reinwald,  though 
the  loss  of  such  a  friend  would  be  to  him  an  infinite 
one,  he  would  far  rather  sacrifice  all  personal  pleasure 
for  the  gain  and  advancement  of  one  who  was  here- 
after to  be  so  great.  Thus  he  wrote  to  Christophine, 
after  reading  a  letter  from  her  to  Fritz  ;  he  said  he  had 
found  therein  "  such  ripe  thought,  so  much  affectionate 
solicitude,"  that  he  made  a  copy  of  it,  and  had  felt  bound 
to  tell  her  his  views  regarding  her  brother's  position. 

Lotte  still  remained  with  her  female  guardian,  and 
she  was  expected  to  visit  her  home  about  the  8th  of 
June.  Reinwald  proposed  that  Schiller  should  come 
with  him  to  Gotha  and  Weimar,  where  he  had  rela- 
tives living.  He  wished  to  introduce  him  to  Gotter 
and  Wieland,  perhaps  even  to  Goethe.  The  plan  prom- 
ised much,  and  Schiller  at  first  agreed  to  it,  although, 
ere  the  baroness  arrived,  he  had  already  altered  his 
mind ;  and  now,  with  the  prospect  of  seeing  Lotte,  it 
seemed  less  and  less  possible  for  him  to  leave  Bauer- 
bach.  At  Wliitsuntide  she  came,  with  her  aunt,  the 
baroness's  eldest  sister,  a  person  of  cultivated  literary 
taste.  For  Schiller  these  were  right  joyful  days.  He 
and  Lotte  could  play  unlimited  games  of  chess  together ; 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  133 

and,  what  was  more  delightful,  he  could  enjoy  her 
society  without  restraint.  "In  truth  she  is  a  study," 
he  tells  Eeinwald  ;  rarelv  has  he  found  such  virtue  and 
such  innocence.  It  was  a  merry  Whit-Tuesday,  that, 
for  the  villagers,  when  ale-barrels  were  emptied,  and 
dancing  was  kept  up  until  well  into  the  night,  even  old 
men  footing  it  in  the  absence  of  younger  swains. 

"  'Tis  certainly  not  a  barbarous  place,  Bauerbach," 
writes  he  to  Eeinwald ;  "  I  have  detected  in  its  people 
more  than  one  touch  of  politeness,  all  the  rarer  to  me 
the  less  I  believed  it  to  lurk  in  natures  so  coarse  and 
rough.  Perhaps  the  diiference  between  these  men  and 
those  who  think  themselves  superior  is  the  same  as  that 
between  a  painting  and  a  plaster-cast." 

He  had  promised  to  lend  Reinwald  his  "  Luise  Miller," 
to  read  upon  the  journey,  when  he  would  give  him  his 
opinion.  But  was  it  likely  that  in  these  blissful  days 
spent  with  Lotte  he  would  have  either  time  or  inchna- 
tion  to  work  at  the  play  ? 

Lotte  did  not  leave  Bauerbach  until  after  the  bar- 
oness's birthday,  on  the  18th  of  June.  Hearing  through 
her  brother  that  Winkelmann  had  spoken  of  Lotte  in 
terms  of  great  discourtesy,  Schiller  to  his  joy  discovered 
that  "  a  goodly  portion  "  of  her  heart  was,  so  far,  her 
own,  and  "  not  by  inheritance  the  property  of  this  idol." 
Thus  his  love  was  strengthened  by  fresh  hope,  a  love 
which  he  dared  not  reveal  to  the  baroness,  although 
he  had  not  wholly  hidden  it  from  her  son.  He  still 
kept  to  his  intention  of  remaining  at  Bauerbach ;  he 
could  work  better  there,  so  he  thought,  although,  in  his 
excitement,  this  was  far  from  being  really  the  case. 
His  only  torment,  in  addition  to  home  reproaches,  was 
the  fear  that  the  duke  might  know  where  he  was  in 
hiding.  This  would  bring  down  vials  of  wrath  upon 
his  benefactress.  And  so  he  wished  by  means  of  a  letter 
dated  from  Frankfort  to  renew  his  petition  for  dismissal. 
Things  fell  out  in  far  other  fashion,  however. 


134  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

Frau  von  Wolzogen  grew  at  length  so  concerned  at 
her  guest's  fit  of  dreamy  idleness,  which  quite  threat- 
ened to  rob  him  of  all  energy,  that  one  day,  as  they 
were  walking  in  the  wood,  she  suggested  that  he  should 
go  and  see  Dalberg  at  Mannheim,  with  whom  he  must 
make  arrangements  about  the  "  Luise  Miller,"  and  other 
plays,  if  possible,  Schiller  could  not  deny  that  to  have 
such  an  outward  incentive  would  be  to  him  of  profit ; 
only  he  stipulated  that  his  absence  should  but  last 
over  a  few  weeks,  and  that  if  Dalberg  offered  to  keep 
him  at  the  theatre,  he  should  return  in  the  following 
spring.  To  the  baroness,  to  her  who  had  his  weal  so 
earnestly  at  heart,  he  gave  his  word  of  honour  that  he 
would  not  take  the  first  step  toward  securing  a  theatri- 
cal appointment.  He  had  firmly  resolved  to  stay  ever 
and  always  at  Bauerbach.  From  this,  too,  Frau  von 
Wolzogen  joyfully  saw  how  noble  a  nature  was  his ; 
and  if  she  did  not  believe  he  could  reasonably  keep 
such  a  promise,  made  though  it  was  in  all  sincerity, 
she  would  not  spoil  the  charm  of  his  dreams  by  any 
remonstrance.  Neither  of  them  reflected,  however, 
that  Dalberg  would  not  be  at  Mannheim  during  that 
summer.  Money  had  now  before  all  things  to  be 
collected  for  the  journey,  and  this  Schiller,  by  using 
the  name  of  his  patroness,  was  able  to  borrow.  One 
Israel,  a  Jew,  lent  him  the  modest  sum  required.  But 
he  had  other  creditors  —  the  village  schoolmaster  and 
the  landlord ;  these  the  poet  had  to  put  off  with  prom- 
ises of  payment  against  his  return. 

Already  on  the  10th  of  July  he  told  Reinwald  of  the 
journey  that  he  had  decided  to  take,  which  would 
prevent  his  showing  him  the  manuscript  of  "  Luise 
Miller ; "  yet  he  did  not  venture  to  say  whither  or  where- 
fore he  was  going.  His  letter  states  that  he  is  to  meet 
his  cousin  (from  London)  at  the  Suabian  frontier. 
This  was  his  godfather,  J.  Christian  Schiller ;  through 
him  he  hopes  to   become    known    in   England.      He 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  135 

repeats  this  again  to  his  friend  before  starting.  For  six 
weeks  or  so  he  was  going  either  to  Frankfort  or  to  the 
Wiirtemberg  frontier,  as  there  were  a  thousand  reasons 
for  his  not  wishing  to  miss  an  interview  with  the  so- 
called  "  cousin  from  England."  Through  him,  perhaps, 
he  might  gain  a  recognised  footing  upon  the  London 
stage,  at  the  Drury  Lane  Theatre ;  for  his  dramas,  by 
reason  of  their  form,  would  be  Likelier  to  please  an 
English  than  a  German  public.  Schiller's  sponsor 
seems  actually  to  have  come  back  to  Suabia  at  this 
time.  Two  years  later  he  was  in  business  as  a  printer 
at  Mainz.  The  poet  writes  another  letter,  one  to  Wil- 
helm  von  Wolzogen,  by  which  he  seeks  to  make  people 
believe  that  he  is  on  his  way  to  America.  He  dates  it 
from  Frankfort,  for  which  city  he  started  in  the  bar- 
oness's carriage  at  early  morning  on  the  24th.  He  lost 
no  time  in  sending  her  word  of  himself. 

"  Believe  me,  dearest  friend,"  he  wrote,  "  as  my  knowl- 
edge of  the  world  grows  wider,  the  more  I  mix  among 
men,  so  much  the  deeper  do  you  engrave  yourself  upon 
my  heart,  so  much  more  precious  do  you  become  to  me. 
You  will  have  had  a  sad  day  and  a  sadder  evening  to 
hve  through  without  our  Lotte  ;  but  the  day  and  evening 
of  my  return  shall  requite  you  for  such  sorrow."  Fear- 
ing the  expense  of  living  at  Frankfort,  he  at  once  pushed 
on  to  Mannheim,  where,  by  sudden  arrival  that  night 
at  the  theatre,  he  thought  pleasantly  to  surprise  his 
friends  the  actors.  He  reached  this  place  with  fifteen 
thalers  in  his  pocket.  Five  he  put  aside  for  the  return 
journey,  and  by  dint  of  economy  —  by  going  without 
breakfast,  even  —  he  made  the  other  ten  last  for  three 
weeks  or  so.  Yet  fate  was  to  keep  him  longer  in 
Mannheim.  There  he  would  gain  theatrical  experi- 
ence ;  there  he  would  fall  into  fresh  grooves,  and,  after 
many  a  keen  fight  with  fortune,  would  be  entangled  in 
such  a  mesh  of  difficulties  as  to  have  need  of  some 
delivering  arm. 


Book  V. 

The  Playwright 


CHAPTER  I. 

FROM  JULY,  1783,  TO  MAY,  1784. 

Schiller  could  not  have  chosen  a  more  unseason- 
able time.  Dalberg  was  to  be  absent  for  another  fort- 
night at  his  country-seat,  Hernsheim  ;  Iffland  and  other 
leading  actors  had  taken  a  holiday  ;  at  the  theatre  only 
stale  pieces  of  a  worthless  class  were  being  played. 
Moreover,  the  weather  was  now  intolerable  in  its  sul- 
triness. Schiller  chafed,  too,  under  his  self-imposed 
economy.  Yet  at  Meyer's  house  he  found  warm  wel- 
come, and  pleasant  lodgings  were  taken  for  him  in  the 
Schloszplatz,  commanding  a  fine  view  of  the  square. 
The  fee  for  room  and  board  was  two  thalers  a  month. 
Here  in  Mannheim,  to  his  joy,  he  saw  Streicher,  who 
was  heartily  delighted  to  meet  his  friend  unexpectedly 
at  Meyer's.  It  was  also  a  pleasure  to  get  such  affec- 
tionate reception  from  the  iuu-people  at  Oggersheim. 
What  served  him  most  was  the  friendly  treatment  of 
his  publisher  Schwan,  at  whose  house,  to  which  he  had 
free  entrance,  he  could  make  many  acquaintances. 
Margareta,  Schwan's  eldest  daughter,  then  in  her  twen- 
tieth year,  met  him  most  cordially.  Since  her  mother's 
death  it  was  she  who  managed  household  affairs.  She 
had  charms  not  only  of  person  but  of  mind;  she  pos- 
sessed that  breadth  of  view  which  culture  gives,  and 
from  her  large  eyes  their  spoke  forth  soul  and  feeling. 
She  felt  deep  sympathy  for  the  poet,  whose  youthful 
ardour  outweighed  all  singularity  of  conduct.  Schwan 
was  much  pleased  with  the  "  Luise  Miller ; "  he  showed 

139 


140  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

its  author  a  letter  from  Wieland,  expressing  warm  feel- 
ing toward  him,  and  prophesying  great  things  for  him 
in  the  future. 

Dalberg  had  offered  him  the  receipts  taken  after  a 
first  performance  of  his  plays  ;  and  then  from  "  Fiesco  " 
and  his  new  drama  (in  six  months'  time  he  could  print 
this  latter)  he  would  earn  from  four  to  five  hundred 
gulden.  Schiller  would  certainly  have  been  contented 
with  the  half  of  such  a  sum  ;  his  wishes  were,  in  sooth, 
most  modest  ones  regarding  money ;  he  longed  for  no 
greater  fortune  than  to  live  always  at  Bauerbach,  where 
all  his  joy  was  centred,  upon  an  annual  income  of  four 
hundred  gulden.  Schwan  counselled  him  to  send  cop- 
ies of  his  plays  to  different  stage-managers  at  Berlin, 
Hamburg,  and  Vienna,  who  would  probably  offer  him 
a  price  for  them.  A  fortnight  after  his  arrival  he 
writes  to  the  baroness :  "  How  great,  how  infinitely 
great  already  has  been  your  improving  influence  upon 
my  heart !  Rejoice  with  me  that  thereby  it  has  borne 
more  than  one  perilous  test.  Do  but  be  fully  conscious 
of  helping  and  of  having  helped  toward  the  right  way 
one  who,  if  given  over  to  evil,  would  have  had  oppor- 
tunity to  ruin  thousands." 

Frau  von  Wolzogen  had  warned  him  not  to  trust 
overmuch  in  others,  but  simply  to  follow  the  still  small 
voice  within  him.  He  tells  her  that  he  has  torn  up  a 
letter  to  Lotte,  for  he  could  not  make  it  a  cold,  formal 
one,  and  if  it  had  warmth  her  guardian  would  never 
countenance  it. 

"  Give  greeting  from  me  to  every  spot  in  Bauerbach," 
says  he  at  the  close,  "  and  let  me  use  the  title  which 
you  have  conferred  upon  me,  a  title  which  no  grander 
one  shall  ever  supplant.  Let  me,  dearest  mother,  let 
me  call  myself  your  most  affectionate  son." 

She,  noble  woman,  in  straitened  circumstances  her- 
self, and  not  without  cares  for  the  future,  was  glad- 
dened by  the  poet's  words  of  gratitude.     To  her  his 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  141 

heart  was  no  less  dear,  less  precious  than  his  might  of 
soul,  yet  she  hoped  that  he  would  be  caught  by  the 
world's  eddying  current,  and  that  he  would  thus  put 
aside  all  thought  of  marriage  with  her  child. 

Dalberg,  who  came  back  on  the  11th  of  August, 
received  Schiller  with  great  friendliness.  The  day 
following  they  had  a  long  interview. 

"  The  man  is  a  mass  of  fire,"  he  writes,  "  but  alas ! 
it  is  fire  of  the  gunpowder  order,  all  blaze  and  bang ! 
Yet  I  thoroughly  believe  that  he  would  hke  me  to  stay 
here,  provided  it  caused  him  no  sacrifice.  My '  Fiesco ' 
is  to  be  given  here  ;  they've  actually  asked  me  to  anno- 
tate the  piece.  Perhaps  I  shall  recast  it  and  go  through 
with  the  representation. 

"  To-morrow,  before  a  large  assembly,  with  Dalberg 
in  the  chair,  my  '  Luise  Miller '  is  to  be  read,  and  they 
will  then  decide  whether  it  can  be  acted  or  not.  Dal- 
berg, to  please  me,  promised  to  give  a  performance  of  my 
'  Eobbers '  and  other  important  plays.  For  this  would 
test  the  strength  of  the  company,  and  it  would  set  me 
aflame.  I  should  be  pleased  if  my  '  Eobbers '  could  be 
acted." 

Dalberg  saw  how  useful  the  poet  would  be  to  him 
at  his  theatre ;  moreover,  he  knew  that  if  he  gave  him 
employment  there,  the  duke  would  now  no  louger 
object.  From  Mannheim  Schiller  made  excursions 
to  Heidelberg  and  Schwetzingen.  Schwan  and  Dalberg 
frequently  invited  him  to  their  house,  and  one  Sunday, 
while  dining  with  the  latter,  an  agreement  was  read 
over  to  him  respecting  his  engagement  as  a  paid  writer 
of  plays  for  the  theatre,  the  appointment  being  fixed  to 
last  twelve  months.  A  letter  from  Bauerbach  had  just 
told  him  that  Winkelmann  was  coming  there  to  stay 
for  two  months.  It  was  quite  impossible  for  them  to 
meet,  so  Schiller  willingly  accepted  Dalberg's  proposal, 
after  making  some  alterations  and  having  stipulated  for 
the  immediate  advance  of  two  hundred  gulden.     Dal- 


142  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

berg  asked  him  in  addition  to  pass  judgment  upon 
Klein's  drama  "  Sickingen,"  sent  in  for  acceptance,  and 
also  to  write  a  notice  of  that  night's  performance  of 
"  The  Robbers."  Anton  Klein,  Schiller's  senior  by  eleven 
years,  had  been  a  Jesuit.  Upon  the  dispersion  of  that 
order  he  had  filled  posts  as  professor  of  poetry  and 
philosophy,  and  as  managing  secretary  to  the  Teutonic 
Society.  His  place,  his  power,  made  him  a  man  of 
mark.  Besides  several  dramas,  he  had  translated  Me- 
tastasio's  "  Death  of  Dido,"  and  had  worked  not  a  little 
in  the  field  of  letters.  His  chief  subjects  of  interest  were 
folk-lore  and  philology.  To  remain  on  friendly  terms 
with  one  so  sagacious  and  so  influential  was,  of  course, 
for  Schiller  a  matter  of  high  importance.  "  The  Rob- 
bers "  was  played  that  evening  to  a  crowded  house  ;  the 
author  was  more  than  content  at  such  success.  But 
next  day,  alas!  ague  seized  him  —  a  kind  of  marsh 
fever  which  during  that  tremendous  heat  made  havoc 
in  the  town.  It  was  a  ghastly  fiend,  this,  risen  up  to 
ruin  all  his  fairest  prospects.  Wlien  sending  back  a 
copy  of  the  amended  agreement,  he  regretted  that 
hitherto  he  had  lost  all  power  of  mental  concentra- 
tion, for  by  the  attacks  of  fever  his  brain  had  greatly 
suffered.  He  undertook  to  remain  in  Mannheim  as 
playwright  for  a  year  from  the  first  of  September. 
Besides  "  Fiesco  "  and  "  Luise  Miller,"  he  engaged  to  pro- 
duce another  drama  for  the  stage  —  only,  during  the  hot 
summer  months  it  would  be  necessary  for  him  to  live 
elsewhere.  Besides  a  yearly  salary  of  three  hundred 
gulden,  he  was  to  have  three  benefit  nights,  one  for 
each  piece ;  the  copyright  was  also  to  be  at  his  dis- 
posal. Yet,  according  to  this,  he  largely  overestimates 
his  earnings  from  that  time  until  next  August,  when 
supposing  them  to  be  from  twelve  to  fourteen  hun- 
dred gulden,  of  which  four  or  five  would  go  toward 
paying  off  debts.  He  straightway  tells  his  family  of 
his  new  appointment.     We  subjoin  a  facsimile  of  the 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  i43 

sister's  letter  of  reply,  to  which  his  mother  added  a 
postscript.  During  his  long  illness  he  had  the  very 
best  of  nurses  in  Frau  Meyer,  whose  husband  lay  also 
sick  of  the  same  disease.  But  one  cause  to  hinder  his 
getting  well  was  that  his  room  was  constantly  filled 
with  visitors.  Schwan,  Dalberg,  Klein,  and  many  of 
the  actors  came  to  see  liim ;  also  another  ex-Jesuit 
named  Trunk.  Schiller  made  friends  with  him ;  he 
was  "  a  living  instance  of  how  much  evil  the  parsons 
can  set  afoot."  Among  other  strangers,  there  came  to 
him  a  freemason,  who  pointed  out  the  gain  that  would 
be  his  if  he  joined  their  newly  founded  order. 

On  21st  September  he  could  inform  the  baroness 
that  thrice  successively  the  fever  had  kept  off;  each 
hour  he  seemed  to  feel  easier.  He  assured  his  bene- 
factress that  his  undying  friendship  for  her  would 
be  an  all-powerful  check  upon  outward  temptation ; 
being  parted  from  her  he  would  regain  that  peace  of 
mind,  which,  through  his  unsettled  position  he  had 
lost.  He  meant  to  continue  the  study  of  medicine,  in 
order  to  have  a  juster  claim  to  future  happiness ;  his 
heart,  it  seems,  could  never  lose  hope  of  Lotte.  He 
will  certainly  write  to  her,  he  says,  in  the  next  letter ; 
though  now,  with  Winkelmann  there,  they  would 
hardly  give  a  thought  to  the  poor  absent  one. 

Dalberg  told  him  the  remarks  passed  upon  "  Fiesco," 
and  asked  for  his  judgment  upon  Spiesz's  play  "  Gen- 
eral Schlenzheim  "  and  Klein's  "  Sickingen."  He  also 
expressed  a  wish  that  he  would  attend  the  committee 
meetings  appointed  to  discuss  theatrical  questions ;  in 
his  new  capacity  this  was  expected  of  him.  Schiller 
wrote  back  asking  which  of  the  two  plays  would  be 
first  needed,  "  Fiesco  "  or  "  Luise  Miller."  The  revision 
and  amendment  of  both  might  take  up  a  month's  time. 
On  the  whole,  the  criticisms  on  "  Fiesco "  were  very 
just,  and  he  intended  to  profit  by  them.  Besides  the 
flowery  language,  Julia,  as  a  character,  and  her  quarrel- 


144  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

scene  with  Leonore  had  been  objected  to ;  the  play's 
climax,  too,  would  have  no  effect  upon  the  stage. 
Schiller  had  sufficient  discretion  to  keep  from  criti- 
cising Klein's  "  Sickingen,"  Wlien  his  brain  was  quite 
clear  again,  he  promised  to  express  a  conscientious 
opinion  thereupon,  although  he  considered  it  pre- 
sumption for  a  young  head  to  pass  judgment  upon 
the  labours  of  an  experienced  senior,  more  especially 
as  they  were  both  workers  in  the  same  field. 

Soon  after  the  poet  found  himself  so  far  restored  as 
to  be  able  to  travel  with  Schwan  and  his  daughter  to 
Speier.  Here  lived  Frau  von  Laroche,  the  authoress, 
who  had  long  wished  to  make  Schiller's  acquaintance. 
He  dined  at  her  house ;  but,  among  so  much  company, 
no  chance  offered  itself  of  gaining  closer  acquaintance 
with  his  distinguised  hostess.  A  week  later  Von  Hoven 
gladdened  him  by  a  visit,  bringing  a  friend  and  fellow 
student  from  Ludwigsburg,  named  Christmanu,  who 
had  great  musical  talent.  He  and  Schiller  talked 
much  upon  favourite  subjects,  upon  human  happiness 
and  human  perfection.  They  went  to  see  Frau  von 
Laroche,  and  in  her  friend,  Herr  von  Hohenfelden, 
Schiller  found  a  noble  model  from  which  to  draw  his 
character  of  Posa  in  "  Don  Carlos." 

On  the  15th  of  October  he  attended  a  meeting  of 
the  theatrical  committee,  when  Iffland  reported  upon 
Pliimicke's  amended  version  of "  The  Piobbers."  Spiesz's 
"  Maria  Stuart "  was  also  discussed.  Three  days  after, 
hearing  that  Pliimicke  was  sending  round  an  adapta- 
tion of  his  "  Fiesco "  to  different  stage-managers,  he 
drew  up  a  notice  publicly  charging  them  to  apply  to 
him  personally,  if  they  wished  to  produce  his  play. 
For  he  would  have  to  retouch  it  here  and  there  before 
it  could  be  put  in  rehearsal.  He  advertised  this  notice 
a  month  later  in  the  Gothaische  Gelehrtc  ZciUingen,  but 
Groszmann  of  Frankfort  was  the  only  one  who  seems 
to  have  given  it  any  attention.     Then  came  a  fresh 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  14S 

attack  of  ague  ;  yet,  violent  though  this  was,  he  had 
to  work  at  "  Fiesco,"  sacrificing  much  of  its  beauty  to 
meet  stage  requirements.  The  sooner  to  free  himself 
from  his  insidious  disease,  he  took  large  doses  of  bark, 
eating  it  "like  bread."  A  ruinous  effect,  this,  upon 
his  digestion,  the  more  so  as  his  diet  was  perforce  a 
most  meagre  one.  Streicher,  who  knew  in  what  hours 
of  strait  and  suffering  these  two  dramas  had  been  com- 
posed, could  never  bear  to  see  them  acted  afterward, 
so  bitter  were  the  recollections  which  they  revived. 
Despite  every  attempt  at  economy,  Schiller  found  him- 
self yet  unable  to  pay  off  his  debts  in  Bauerbach  and 
Stuttgart.  It  tortured  him  to  feel  that  his  family  still 
suffered  anxiety  on  his  account,  that  his  mother  had 
through  him  become  a  chronic  invahd,  that  his  father 
still  bitterly  reproached  him  with  having  foiled  their 
hopes ;  they  could  only  look  for  his  support  and  aid,  if  he 
went  back  to  the  profession  that  he  had  abandoned.  All 
this  was  in  the  highest  degree  crushing  to  Schiller's 
sensitive  temperament ;  he  only  mastered  it  by  virtue 
of  that  faculty  of  "  happy  buoyancy  "  {Iwlde  Leichtsinn), 
which,  according  to  Goethe's  "  Tasso,"  helps  mortals  to 
endure  the  unendurable.  This  faculty  he  had  in  large 
degree.  And  now  he  left  his  lodgings  and  went  into 
others  which  Streicher,  from  experience,  could  greatly 
recommend.  As  servant  to  wait  upon  him  he  had  a 
drummer.  His  appetite  continued  as  failing  as  before ; 
a  dinner  costing  twelve  kreuzers  would  be  brought  to 
him  in  a  tin  trencher,  and  he  kept  what  remained  of 
this  for  supper.  A  bread-roll  formed  his  breakfast. 
On  his  birthday,  a  friend  made  him  a  present  of  four 
bottles  of  Burgundy,  and  he  drank  a  glass  or  so  of  this 
at  times.  Soon  he  poured  out  his  heart  afresh  to  his 
loving  patroness,  telling  her  how  pushed  he  is  for 
money,  though  ere  the  close  of  January  he  expects  to 
receive  at  least  four  hundred  gulden,  of  which  he  will 
send  her  either  one  hundred  and  fifty  or  two  hundred. 


146  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

The  only  houses  to  which  he  went  were  Schwan's  and 
Dalberg's.  He  was  on  "  affable  and  courteous  "  terms 
with  the  actors,  but  in  other  ways  quite  a  recluse ; 
Bock  had  the  greatest  share  of  his  confidence  of  them 
all ;  his  heart  and  mind  were,  so  he  thought,  the  best ; 
he  had  real  solidity,  real  ballast.  Many  men  of  art 
and  science  had  visited  him,  he  said,  but  "  his  attach- 
ments were  not  made  lightly  nor  all  at  once." 

"  As  regards  ladies  here,  I  may  as  well  tell  you  that 
they  count  for  very  little ;  with  the  exception  of  one 
of  the  actresses,  Fraulein  Schwan  {die  Schwanin)  is 
almost  the  only  person  with  claim  to  excellence.  She 
and  some  others  cause  me  at  times  an  agreeable  hour ; 
for  I  readily  confess  that  to  me  the  society  of  the  fair 
sex,  as  society,  is  far  from  distasteful." 

Charmed  though  he  might  have  been  by  Margareta's 
grace  and  accomplishments,  his  heart  still  clung  to 
Lotte.  The  actress  alluded  to  was  a  friend  of  Fraulein 
Schwan's,  Caroline  Ziegler.  Two  years  before  she  had 
gone  upon  the  stage,  and  now,  in  her  eighteenth  year, 
was  engaged  to  marry  the  actor  Beck.  Her  father  was 
in  court  employ.     Iffiand,  speaking  of  her,  writes : 

"  Her  reading  was  marked  by  great  taste,  and  the 
sense  for  things  beautiful  grew  rapidly  within  her. 
Bare  susceptibility  of  feeling,  without  any  tendency  to 
vapid  gush,  stamped  each  artistic  effort  with  a  supreme 
simphcity."  He  goes  on  to  praise  her  happy  sense  for 
fitness  and  measure,  when  swept  away  by  the  fire  of 
passion  ;  he  terms  her  genius  "  real,  sublime."  Schiller 
was  greatly  fascinated  by  a  talent  so  unique,  so  unas- 
suming ;  albeit  her  love  for  her  future  husband  made 
any  deeper  feehng  on  his  part  impossible. 

As  Schiller  sat  writing  his  letter  to  Frau  von  Wol- 
zogen,  to  his  joy  there  broke  in  upon  him  Abel,  his 
beloved  master,  with  Batz,  an  old  fellow  pupil.  He 
was  mightily  surprised  to  see  them  stalk  in,  in  student- 
dress,  with  spurs  and  sword,  on  their  way  back  from  a 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  147 

trip  to  Frankfort.  All  cares  were  at  once  forgotten. 
He  soon  sends  the  baroness  a  joyful  account  of  the 
visit.  "  How  delightful  was  the  time  passed  with  my 
bosom  friends  and  countrymen !  They  dined  and 
supped  with  me  (you  see  I'm  already  a  fellow  that 
keeps  his  table),  and  my  bottles  of  Burgundy  proved  a 
veritable  godsend.  I  went  out  both  yesterday  and 
to-day,  just  to  show  them  about  a  bit.  No  matter  if  I 
take  longer  to  get  well ;  at  least  I've  had  an  indescribable 
pleasure ! "  He  cannot  write  to  Lotte  yet,  he  says  at 
the  letter's  end ;  but  he  means  to  pay  them  a  flying 
visit  before  long ;  meanwhile,  to  her  and  to  her 
"  literary "  aunt  he  sends   messages  of  regard. 

Dalberg  asked  Schiller  at  this  time  to  furnish  some 
congratulatory  hues  in  honour  of  the  Kurfiirstin.  Her 
name-day  was  on  the  19th,  when  he  intended  them 
to  be  spoken  from  the  stage.  But  Schiller  threw  such 
biting  satire  into  what  he  wrote,  that  of  praise  or 
homage  his  verses  had  nothing ;  they  were  little  short 
of  a  lampoon.  Dalberg,  delighted,  was  for  printing 
them  then  and  there ;  however,  to  have  them  recited 
at  his  theatre  was,  of  course,  impossible.  And  so  the 
Kurfiirstin  had  to  go  without  her  lines  of  welcome, 
to  Schiller's  intense  amusement. 

His  "  Fiesco  "  was  not  finished  until  the  end  of  the 
month.  He  had  made  many  alterations,  had  rewritten 
several  passages,  and  even  whole  acts ;  in  so  suffering  a 
state  this  was  a  double  strain  upon  his  powers.  There 
was  a  certain  quartermaster  whom  he  tried  to  make  his 
amanuensis,  dictating  the  play  to  him  while  walking 
up  and  down  the  room.  But  the  man's  spelling  was 
so  outrageously  bad,  that  Schiller,  in  despair,  himself 
undertook  the  tedious  task  of  preparing  a  fair  copy 
of  the  text,  which  he  afterward  had  transcribed  for 
the  stage.  By  the  middle  of  December  he  was  able 
to  put  his  work  into  Dalberg's  hands,  who  at  once  paid 
him  the  last  hundred  gulden  for  the  year  ending  with 


/ 


148  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  August  of  1784.  Schiller  took  keen  interest  in 
the  rehearsals ;  if  they  caused  him  annoyance,  they 
served  to  distract  and  even  to  amuse  him ;  he  was 
specially  pleased  with  Fraulein  Ziegler's  enchanting 
presentment  of  Leonore.  At  Dalberg's  request  he 
wrote  some  words  "  To  the  Public,"  which,  as  before, 
when  "  The  Robbers "  was  given,  were  to  be  printed 
on  the  playbill.  In  justification  of  the  Uberty  he  had 
taken  with  history,  he  urged  that  a  dramatist  must 
think  more  of  his  influence  upon  the  pubhc  than  of 
the  matter  which  helps  him  to  such  influence ;  one 
felt  more  drawn  to  learn  of  a  great  man  than  of  a 
criminal.  "  Fiesco "  here  stood  before  them  in  the 
former  light.  The  moral  of  the  piece  was  the  grandest 
one  could  find  in  life ;  each  might  learn  therefrom  to 
fling  aside  his  highest  gains  for  his  country's  weal. 
After  generalising  thus  oddly,  he  ends  with  the  phrase, 
"  I  could  not  well  say  less  to  a  public  that  by  its 
friendly  reception  of  my  '  Robbers '  has  quickened  my 
passion  for  the  stage  —  a  public  to  which  I  shall  dedi- 
cate all  future  efforts  in  dramatic  literature." 

The  poet  was  not  oversanguine  about  his  work ; 
despite  many  amendments,  he  felt  how  much  it  lost  of 
grandeur,  of  completeness.  Wliile  busied  with  "  Fiesco," 
he  at  the  same  time  revised  his  "  Luise  Miller,"  which 
was  to  be  printed  before  being  put  on  the  stage. 
It  had  need  of  far  less  alteration  —  only  a  touch  here 
and  there.  Dalberg  was  now  endeavouring  to  secure 
Schiller's  enrolment  as  a  member  of  the  KurfUrstliche 
Deutsche  Gesellschaft ;  for  this  the  poet  was  most 
anxious,  as  it  put  him  under  the  Kurfiirst's  protection, 
even  if  it  did  not  make  him  a  subject  of  the  Pfalz. 
As  the  year  ended  there  was  little  to  bring  him  cheer 
or  comfort ;  eight  months  before  his  whole  income  had 
been  spent,  and  there  seemed  no  prospect  of  getting 
free  from  debt.  The  baroness  sent  his  letters  no 
answer ;  his  father  was  not  sparing  in  words  of  warn- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  149 

ing  and  rebuke.  Just  at  the  close  of  December  there 
had  come  a  letter  from  his  sister.  It  distressed  him 
greatly,  for  it  told  of  his  mother's  continued  suffering. 
Christophine  reminded  him  of  his  father's  injunction 
to  come  back  to  Solitude.  This  would  help  to  soothe 
the  mother,  and  he  could  prepare  to  pass  his  medical 
examination,  although,  of  course,  the  duke's  permission 
must  be  asked.  But  Schiller  firmly  refused  to  make 
any  such  request ;  it  was  against  his  honour.  What 
would  the  world  say  ?  His  flight,  and  the  high  motives 
which  drove  him  to  it,  would  be  termed  a  mere  piece 
of  childish  bravado  —  a  hetise ;  people  would  declare 
that,  being  unable  to  find  means  of  living,  he  had 
penitently  returned.  Even  were  his  father  to  procure 
permission,  he  could  never  come  back  with  any  blot 
upon  his  character.  Again,  if  the  duke  proved  inex- 
orable, such  an  affront  to  his  parent  were  best  resented 
by  bold  continuance  in  his  folly. 

On  the  1 0th  of  January  Schiller,  "  well-known 
through  his  poetry,"  was  elected  an  ordinary  member 
of  the  Deutsche  Gesellschaft.  Such  a  choice  required 
the  Kurfiirst's  sanction.  Next  day  "  Fiesco  "  was  put 
upon  the  stage.  In  that  week  Fraulein  Ziegler's 
marriage  with  Beck  had  taken  place ;  she  was  to  act 
Leonore,  and  her  husband  Bourgognino.  The  first  per- 
formance lasted  four  hours.  Despite  elaborate  mount- 
ing, although  most  of  the  parts  were  filled  to  perfection, 
and  many  a  scene  won  loud  applause,  the  play  as  a 
whole  fell  flat;  the  Mannheim  public  failed  to  wax 
enthusiastic  over  a  tale  of  repubhcan  conspiracy.  Beil's 
portrait  of  Mohr  was  a  characteristic  one,  and  full  of 
spirit ;  as  Fiesco  and  Verrina,  Bock  and  Iffland  were 
each  excellent ;  so,  too,  was  Frau  Eennschub  as  the 
Contessa  Imperiali.  But  the  success  was  a  far  less 
triumphant  one  than  that  of  "  The  Bobbers."  At 
a  committee  meeting  held  on  the  14th,  Dalberg,  in 
Schiller's  presence,  pointed  out  some  of  the  reasons 


150  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

for  this.  "  There  are  too  many  beauties  in  the  piece," 
he  said ;  "  the  dialogue  is  pitched  in  too  high  a  key  for 
the  public  at  a  first  hearing  either  to  understand  or  to 
enjoy.  It  takes  too  long  to  act.  There  are  scenes  — 
there  are  passages  which  could  be,  nay,  which  must 
be  condensed.  The  stage  machinery  is  too  complex. 
The  Contessa  Imperiali's  peroration  at  the  close  of  the 
fourth  act,  and  the  subsequent  love-scene  for  Leonore, 
are  too  spun  out ;  they  began  to  bore  one  in  spite  of 
the  excellent  acting.  Moreover,  the  scene  with  the 
painter  would  bear  pruning  also." 

Most  of  the  actors  were  commended,  especially  Bell 
as  Mohr,  Bock  as  Fiesco  (he  ought  not,  however,  to 
have  come  on  in  ball  dress  at  the  close  of  Act  iv.), 
and  Iffland  as  Verrina.  But  the  latter,  by  his  manner- 
isms, and  by  occasional  overacting,  gave  to  the  part 
a  certain  unreahty.  Schiller,  at  this  same  committee 
meeting,  reported  upon  a  drama  produced  in  Vienna, 
called  "  Kronau  and  Albertine,"  which  had  been  given 
him  to  criticise.  It  did  not  pass  the  line  of  mediocrity, 
though  certainly  there  were  scenes  in  it  which  upon 
the  stage  would   have  their  effect. 

At  the  second  performance  of  "  Fiesco,"  on  the  18th, 
it  met  with  more  marked  approval.  Schwan  was 
meanw^hile  printing  the  "  Luise  Miller,"  as  before  that 
a  piece  by  IfHand  was  to  be  played.  At  present 
Schiller  preferred  to  postpone  his  benefit  night,  for 
snow  and  frost  and  floods  blocked  up  the  roadways, 
and  but  few  strangers  could  come  to  the  town.  The 
piece  was  only  acted  once  more,  on  February  15th; 
then  it  was  shelved ;  while  of  "  The  Robbers,"  on  the 
contrary,  three  further  representations  were  given  in 
that  year. 

Another  cause  for  chagrin,  besides  the  failure  of  his 
play,  was  Frau  von  Wolzogen's  silence ;  naturally  she 
had  little  wish  to  entrust  her  daughter's  happiness 
to  one  in  such  precarious  circumstances.     But  he  had 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  151 

now  given  up  any  idea  of  union  with  Lotte.  Marriage, 
so  he  then  wrote  to  Zumsteeg,  would  draw  him  oft' 
the  road  to  fortune ;  and  though  with  all  his  many 
caprices  he  might  fail  of  reaching  high  renown,  he 
was  too  vehement  in  temper  and  too  warm-hearted 
ever  to  make  any  woman  happy.  Yet  his  soul  longed, 
and  longed  deeply,  for  the  order,  the  tranquillity  of 
home ;  he  needed  some  spot  to  lift  him  above  the 
vulgar  cares  of  existence ;  he  needed  the  gladdening 
influence  of  a  wife's  affection. 

It  was  a  pleasure  for  him  finally  to  receive  the 
Kurfiirst's  tardy  consent  to  his  election.  But  he  was 
in  debt.  This  thought  troubled  him,  this  cramped  his 
powers,  this  kept  him  back  from  working  at  a  third 
play  which  he  had  promised  to  have  ready  in  August. 
Yet  at  times  many  a  likely  scheme  would  cross  his 
mind ;  he  still  studied  the  history  of  Carlos,  and 
brooded  thereupon.  Perhaps,  too,  he  had  the  project 
of  writing  a  sequel  to  his  "  Robbers,"  in  which  a  ghost 
should  give  the  turn  to  events ;  after  awhile,  however, 
this  seemed  to  him  at  variance  with  the  dignity  of  drama. 

He  now  made  frank  confession  of  his  debts  to  his 
father,  proposing,  with  his  help,  to  pay  them  off  by 
instalment.  Schiller  pire,  while  consenting,  vigorously 
urged  him  to  economise,  even  advising  him  to  find 
some  thrifty  wife  to  save  him  in  his  distress.  To  our 
poet,  battling  with  poverty,  such  counsel  was  gall 
indeed.  Nay  more,  the  father  went  so  far  as  to  ask 
Dalberg  to  keep  an  eye  upon  his  spendthrift  son,  to 
find  him  some  mentor  who  might  teach  him  how 
to  live  within  his  income. 

Then  there  was  the  baroness ;  Schiller  had  to  pacify 
her.  The  season  had  been  too  bad  a  one,  he  said,  to 
ask  for  a  benefit  night ;  he  had  thus  lost  a  hundred 
gulden.  At  Eastertide  he  pledged  his  word  of  honour 
to  pay  her  the  sum  of  eight  Carolines,  and  to  settle 
with  his  other  creditors  at  Bauerbach.     Were  she  in 


152  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

absolute  need  of  the  money,  he  would  raise  it  by  hook 
or  by  crook.  A  day  ago  he  had  had  to  send  fifty 
i£ulden  to  Stuttorart.  On  the  9  th  of  March  his  father 
made  bitter  complaint  that  this  promised  sum  had  not 
yet  been  sent ;  Schiller,  under  protest,  was  thus  com- 
pelled to  forward  it.  Besides  other  work,  he  was  now 
chiefly  occupied  with  the  rehearsals  of  "  Luise  Miller." 
The  title  had  been  changed  to  "  Plot  and  Passion." 
Such  success  had  attended  Iffland's  "  Crime  through 
Ambition,"  that  Schiller  and  his  friends  feared  that  it 
might  throw  his  play  into  the  shade,  Dalberg,  in 
committee,  spoke  rapturously  of  the  "  reality,  the 
grandeur "  of  Iffland's  "  fresco,"  praising  its  splendid 
situations,  the  simplicity  of  its  plot,  its  easy,  natural 
language,  its  high  moral  tone.  These  were  merits,  he 
said,  that  "  Fiesco  "  had  lacked.  And  so,  chiefly  on  the 
score  of  the  play's  "high  moral  tone,"  the  Kurfiirst- 
liche  Deutsche  Gesellschaft  awarded  its  author  a  gold 
medal.  Schroder  of  A^ienna,  in  answer  to  Dalberg's 
strictures  on  "  Fiesco,"  wrote  back  that  the  writer  had 
chosen  a  path  which  must  inevitably  lead  to  the  ruin 
of  the  drama  and  the  stage ;  therefore,  for  his  very 
talent's  sake,  he  hated  him.  Upon  Dalberg  such  words 
were  not  void  of  their  effect.  Still,  Schiller  had  the 
secret  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  his  "  Eobbers  "  was 
being  acted  in  the  very  town  to  which  he  dared  not 
come,  in  Stuttgart.  I  Aland  had  been  summoned 
thither  to  play  Franz  Moor.  "  It  has  been  given 
again,"  writes  the  father,  on  April  4th,  "  amid  great 
applause;  the  receipts  reached  220  gulden  —  a  very 
large  sum  for  Stuttgart.  They  say,  too,  that  the  other 
plays  are  in  course  of  preparation."  In  Stuttgart  the 
legend  was  already  afloat  that  Schiller  had  married 
Margareta  Schwan,  whose  father  had  at  last  published 
"  Plot  and  Passion,"  which  appeared  without  either 
dedication  or  preface. 

On  the  15th,  after  much  careful  rehearsal,  weari- 


THE  LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  153 

some  alike  to  author  and  to  actor,  Schiller's  "  tragedy 
of  bourgeois  life  "  was  put  upon  the  boards ;  its  very- 
genius  carried  it  through,  and  made  it  echpse  Iffland's 
tame  httle  sketch  of  domestic  morals.  Schiller  hoped 
much  from  the  first  performance ;  he  and  Streicher 
were  at  the  theatre  in  a  private  box.  He  anxiously 
watched  the  piece's  progress,  his  face  and  features 
changing  at  every  point  the  players  made  or  missed. 
At  the  end  of  the  first  act  he  only  said,  "  It's  going 
well."  The  following  one,  and  notably  its  closing 
scene,  were  rendered  with  such  fire  that,  as  the  drop 
fell,  the  whole  audience  rose  to  its  feet  amid  a  storm 
of  applause.  Such  triumph  moved  the  poet  greatly, 
and  he  came  forward  to  bow  his  acknowledgments. 
The  house  maintained  its  enthusiasm  until  the  end. 
Beck  and  his  young  wife  played  the  lovers  to  per- 
fection ;  Frau  Rennschlib  was  Lady  Milford,  Iffiand 
taking  the  part  of  Wurm,  with  Bcick  as  the  President. 
Groszmann  had  produced  the  piece,  two  days  before, 
in  Frankfort ;  here,  as  also  in  Berhn,  "  Fiesco "  had 
been  given  and  had  met  with  more  success.  Goethe's 
mother  was  among  its  admirers.  In  the  Prussian 
capital  it  had  received  stu-ring  welcome,  and  soon 
after  the  Mannheim  performance  it  was  acted  at  the 
Karnthner  Theatre,  in  Vienna. 

At  this  time  Schiller  would  gladly  have  gone  to 
Bauerbach  to  thank  his  benefactress  and  to  make  with 
her  his  peace.  But  he  had  not  the  money.  However, 
to  his  great  delight,  at  the  end  of  April  he  was  able 
to  accompany  Beil  and  Iffiand  to  Frankfort,  where 
Groszmann  had  offered  them  engagements.  Schiller 
was  to  report  upon  their  debut,  and  upon  the  state  of 
theatrical  matters  in  that  city.  The  opening  piece  was 
Iffland's  "  Crime  through  Ambition,"  which  was  acted 
on  the  30th.  The  next  day  Schiller  writes  to  Eenn- 
schiib,  the  regisseur : 

"  To  a  packed  house,  and  amid  breathless  silence, 


154  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

HeiT  Iffland's  drama  was  played  last  night ;  both 
Ittlaud  aud  Beil  were  called  before  the  curtain,  and 
vociferously  applauded.  There  is  general  enthusiasm 
for  the  Mannheim  actors ;  Groszmann's  company  — 
which  yesterday,  they  say,  outshone  itself  —  dwindles 
to  nothing  by  the  side  of  ours.  We're  dragged  about 
from  one  banquet  to  another." 

That  night  Schroder's  comedy,  "  A  Father's  Ven- 
geance," was  given,  and  then  on  the  3d  of  April, 
"  Plot  and  Passion."  Remembering  the  excellence  of 
the  Mannheim  performance,  Schiller  feared  somewhat 
for  the  success  of  this  one ;  yet  with  Beil  and  Ittland, 
and  by  being  present  himself,  they  might  secure  an 
effect  greater  than  could  be  hoped  for  from  such  a 
company  of  actors.  Each  did  his  utmost,  and  there 
was  no  want  of  genuine  approval,  although  IfHand's 
drama,  being  of  the  conventional  type,  was  better 
suited  to  the  performers'  powers  than  a  play  so  poetic, 
so  full  of  genius  as  Schiller's. 

One  actress,  however,  the  Luise  of  the  piece,  made 
deep  impression  upon  Schiller's  heart  and  mind.  It 
was  Sophie  Albrecht,  daughter  of  Professor  Baumer,  of 
Erfurt.  Her  father  dying  when  she  was  sixteen,  she 
married  a  Doctor  Albrecht,  who  hold  an  appointment 
as  physician-in-ordinary  to  a  wealthy  nobleman  at 
Reval.  She  was  possessed  of  exceptional  talent,  and 
being  bent  upon  becoming  an  actress,  she  made  a  first 
trial  of  her  powers  at  Erfurt,  and  in  October,  1783,  she 
joined  Groszmann's  company  with  a  view  to  maturing 
them.  Schiller  was  quite  carried  away  by  the  passion- 
ate love  she  showed  for  her  art  and  for  all  that  was 
beautiful  and  ennobling. 

"  Already  in  the  first  few  hours  we  became  firmly, 
closely  linked  to  each  other ;  between  our  souls  there 
was  a  mutual  understandmg."  He  writes  thus  to 
Reiuwald  soon  after  his  return. 

"  It  is  my  joy,  my  pride,  that  she  is  attached  to  me. 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLEB  155 

and  that  maybe  she  draws  some  happiness  from  my 
acquaintance.  Hers  is  a  heart  formed  but  for  sym- 
pathy. Set  high  above  the  petty  spirit  of  common 
circles,  she  is  full  of  a  pure  and  noble  sense  for  truth 
and  honour,  winning  even  respect  for  qualities  not 
found  in  her  sex.  I  promise  myself  blissful  days 
in  her  society  [i.e.  if  she  comes  to  Mannheim).  .  .  . 
She  is  a  poet,  too,  full  of  feeling  and  tenderness.  True, 
as  an  actress  her  talent  is  great ;  but  among  a  company 
such  as  this  she  can  never  cultivate  it ;  along  such  a 
path  she  will  make  no  speedy  advance,  nay,  though  it 
be  at  the  risk  of  her  heart  —  her  heart  so  beauteous, 
so  unique.  .  .  .  The  doctor  is  also  a  dear  and  valued 
friend  of  mine." 

He  passionately  implored  Reiuwald  to  dissuade  her 
from  following  a  theatrical  life,  as  he  himself  had 
done ;  that  perhaps  they  might  win  for  mankind  a 
noble  soul,  even  though  they  robbed  the  world  of  a 
great  actress.  In  his  jealous  affection  he  would  not 
suffer  one  so  full  of  spirituality  and  charm  to  mix 
with  the  common  greenroom  throng  —  to  vie  with 
that  for  the  favour  of  the  mass.  Reinwald,  no  doubt, 
looked  closer  and  judged  with  clearer  eye,  when  he 
remarked  in  her  both  affectation  and  false  sentiment. 

Schiller  in  this  hour  stood  at  the  summit  of  his  suc- 
cess. His  last  play  was  a  triumph,  while  "  Fiesco " 
and  "  The  Eobbers  "  both  held  the  stage,  although  the 
former  had  met  with  much  adverse  criticism.  In  lieu 
of  his  two  benefit  performances,  he  agreed  to  accept 
the  sum  of  two  hundred  gulden,  to  be  paid  in  instal- 
ments every  four  months.  Besides  "  Don  Carlos,"  his 
thoughts  were  set  on  the  issue  of  a  dramatic  journal, 
which  he  was  hoping  to  publish  on  behalf  of  the 
Kurfiirstliche  Deutsche  Gesellschaft.  Yet  while  anxious 
to  be  active,  and  to  do  great  work  in  the  world,  he 
still  longs  for  a  life  of  quiet  and  seclusion.  To  Eein- 
wald  he  says : 


156  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

"  My  wants  in  the  great  world  are  many,  and  ex- 
haustless  as  my  ambition,  yet  how  all  this  shrinks  to 
nothing  beside  my  passion  for  a  joy  more  restful,  more 
calm ! " 

He  maybe  was  dreaming  then  of  happy  union  with 
Schwan's  captivating  daughter  —  she  upon  whom  re- 
port had  already  fixed  as  his  own.  But  soon  he  saw 
himself  stranded  farther  than  ever  from  a  life  of  calm 
enjoyment ;  his  affairs  caused  him  new  and  deeper 
embarrassment.  Two  friends  were  now  to  be  his ; 
the  one  was  to  set  his  brain  awhirl,  goading  him  to 
frenzy  —  the  other  was  to  bring  gladness  to  his  heart, 
standing  at  the  last  as  saving  angel  by  his  side. 


CHAPTER  II. 

FROM  MAY,  1784,  TO  APRIL,  1785. 

On  the  morning  of  the  9th  of  May  Major  von  Kalb 
and  his  wife  visited  him  ;  the  latter  brought  a  note 
from  Reinwald.  He,  introducing  her,  says :  "  She 
is  greatly  distinguished  from  among  others  of  her  sex, 
and  is  a  warm  admirer  of  your  writings,  as  she 
cherishes  deep  enthusiasm  for  what  is  beautiful  and 
good,"  Already,  at  the  beginning  of  1783,  he  had 
heard  of  the  family  through  Frau  von  Wolzogen,  and 
now  he  is  able  to  tell  her  of  the  pleasant  days  spent 
with  Frau  von  Kalb  and  her  husband.  He  remarks 
that  the  former  has  much  intellect ;  she  is  not  of  the 
common  stamp  of  women.  That  very  evening  "  Plot 
and  Passion  "  was  to  be  acted  a  second  time ;  and  what 
was  his  consternation  as  he  remembered  that  in  the 
piece  there  was  a  fussy,  vulgar-minded  courtier  called 
by  the  very  name  Kalb,  that  he  now  held  in  such  high 
respect !  Nor  was  he  able  to  hide  his  perplexity  from 
the  major  ;  yet  it  was  impossible  to  rename  the  char- 
acter ;  such  an  alteration  would  inevitably  point  one 
to  seek  its  cause,  more  especially  as  the  playbills  were 
already  printed. 

Charlotte  Marschalk  von  Ostheim  and  her  sister 
Eleonore  rank  among  the  most  luckless  of  Germany's 
heroines  during  the  last  century.  Charlotte  was  born 
on  the  25th  of  July,  1761,  Eleonore  on  the  5th  of 
January,  1764,  at  Waltershausen  in  Franconia.  Their 
natures  were  widely  different.     If  her  sister  was  gentler 

157 


158  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

and  more  feminine,  Charlotte  had  more  force  of  intel- 
lect and  will ;  her  soul  had  touched  greater  depths  of 
melancholy  and  passion.  Naturally  of  morbid,  gloomy 
disposition,  family  sorrows  had  done  nmch  to  heighten 
this  gloom.  To  her  the  swift  and  sudden  loss  of  Loth 
parents  was  a  crushing  blow ;  she  longed  ever  to  be 
left  alone  with  her  grief ;  they  had  to  part  her  from 
the  other  children.  Yet  change  of  scene  and  study 
failed  to  cheer  her ;  she  grew  ever  more  thoughtful, 
more  reserved,  living  but  in  a  dreamland  of  her  own, 
although  this  temporary  absence  from  brother  and 
sisters  only  strengthened  her  love  for  them.  Williel- 
mine,  at  nineteen,  married  against  her  will  a  F'reiherr 
Waldner  von  Freundstein  of  Alsace,  and  Charlotte  felt 
this  parting  keenly.  Her  only  brother,  a  student  in 
Gottingen,  had  promised  to  take  her  next  year  to  her 
married  sister,  but  in  that  November  he  died  from  the 
effects  of  an  accident.  Three  weeks  before  he  had 
written  to  her  that  his  friend  Kalb  would  soon  visit 
them  to  pay  his  respects  to  Eleonore.  Kalb  had  been 
dismissed  by  the  Duke  of  Weimar  from  the  post  of 
President  of  the  Chamber ;  he  had  brought  the  state 
finances  into  great  disorder.  Eleonore,  on  the  very  day 
of  her  brother's  death,  was  persuaded  by  an  uncle  to 
give  this  repulsive,  heartless  man  her  hand ;  he  had 
now  a  fresh  field  for  distinction.  In  that  December, 
while  yet  grieving  for  the  lost  brother,  her  wedding 
took  place  at  Nordheim.  Then,  on  the  6th  of  January, 
Wilhelmine  died  in  giving  birth  to  a  child.  Kalb 
undertook  the  management  of  the  property  remaining 
to  the  sisters,  but  wasted  much  of  their  income  in 
needless  litigation.  While  living  together  at  Danken- 
feld  there  came  that  autumn  the  ex-president's  younger 
brother,  Major  Heinrich  Julius  von  Kalb,  who  had 
seen  service  in  America  and  elsewhere.  Eleonore's 
husband  was  overjoyed  at  this.  Charlotte  must  marry 
his  brother;  this  would  give  him  sole  and  undivided 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  159 

right  to  all  the  estates.  And  she,  despairing  of  all 
earthly  happiness,  was  brought  to  consent.  But  mar- 
riage only  increased  her  reserve,  and  life  at  Baireuth 
that  winter  was  sad  enough.  At  length  the  sisters 
met  in  Waltershausen.  Charlotte,  not  wishing  to  be 
parted  from  her  husband,  went  with  him  to  the  garri- 
son at  Landau.  She  had  a  strange  craving  to  see  more 
of  the  world,  to  make  fresh  associations.  Thus,  in 
May,  she  again  left  her  sister. 

In  this  youthful  bride,  with  her  large  dark  eyes  and 
raven  hair,  our  poet  must  have  felt  deep  interest,  for 
all  that  she  said  gave  proof  of  intense  individuality 
and  passion.  Yet  she  failed  to  charm  him ;  her  man- 
ner was  forced  ;  it  wanted  naturalness,  ease.  In  "  The 
Robbers  "  Charlotte  found  much  to  admire,  although 
the  play  so  shocked  her  as  a  whole  that  she  had  no 
wish  to  see  it  acted.  The  performance  of  "  Plot  and 
Passion  "  deeply  affected  her.  Next  day  they  went  to 
see  the  Museum  of  Antiquities,  the  Jesuit  Church,  and 
the  pretty  park  of  Waldheim,  lying  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Rhine.  On  the  evening  of  the  11th  the  major 
and  his  wife  took  their  leave  amid  many  assurances 
that  they  would  repeat  their  visit. 

With  his  third  tragedy,  promised  for  the  end  of 
August,  Schiller  unfortunately  could  make  no  satis- 
factory advance.  Acting  on  Wieland's  hint,  that  a 
drama,  properly  to  deserve  that  name,  must  be  in  verse 
and  not  in  prose,  he  had  begun  to  write  "  Don  Carlos  " 
in  five-footed  iambics.  It  was  in  truth  a  tremendous 
task.  Then  he  had  still  a  dramatic  journal  in  project, 
to  be  published  under  the  auspices  of  the  Deutsche 
Gesellschaft.  But  here  he  was  hampered  by  unlooked- 
for  obstacles ;  the  one  party  would  know  nothing  of 
theatrical  news  or  criticism ;  others  —  like  Scliwan, 
for  instance  —  thought  that  in  such  a  periodical  there 
should  certainly  be  space  allotted  to  this.  Disputes  of 
this  kind,  the  impossibility  of  finishing  his    play  in 


i6o  THE  LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

time,  his  debts,  and  a  fresh  attack  of  ague,  were  causes 
which  jointly  helped  to  deepen  his  depression.  While 
in  this  gloomy  state  he  was  surprised  by  the  arrival  of 
a  packet  from  Leipzig,  sent  anonymously  by  four  per- 
sons, who  had  thus  sought  to  show  to  him  their  grati- 
tude and  respect.  The  letter  accompanying  it  ran 
thus  : 

"  At  a  time  when  Art  ever  more  degrades  herself  by 
becoming  the  paid  hirehng  of  the  rich  and  powerful,  it 
is  good  when  a  great  man  stands  forth  to  show  what 
may  yet  be  done  by  human  hand.  The  better  portion 
of  mankind,  sickened  with  its  epoch,  pining  amid  a 
maze  of  puppets  for  something  really  great,  here  slakes 
its  thirst,  hereby  feels  itself  swept  to  a  level  higher 
than  that  of  its  fellows,  and  draws  fresh  strength 
wherewith  to  press  onward,  by  paths  the  most  toilsome, 
toward  a  worthy  goal.  Then,  then  it  would  fain  grasp 
its  benefactor's  hand,  would  show  him  its  tears  of  joy 
and  transport,  that  he  too  might  take  heart  in  any 
hour  of  despair,  if  ever  burdened  by  the  thought,  '  Of 
what  good,  this,  that  I  am  doing  for  my  fellow 
men  ? ' " 

Words  such  as  these  touched  Schiller's  heart  at  its 
core  ;  they  could  not  have  come  to  him  at  fitter  season. 
The  writer  had  added  a  composition  of  his  own  —  a 
setting  of  Amalia's  song,  "Fair  as  an  angel;"  he  de- 
clined to  reveal  his  name  until,  by  winning  distinction 
in  another  field,  he  should  prove  that  he,  too,  was 
among  the  salt  of  the  earth.  He  was  Christian  Gott- 
fried Korner,  born  on  the  2d  of  July,  1756,  at  Leipzig, 
where  his  father  held  an  appointment  as  professor. 
Having  completed  a  course  of  legal  study  at  Gottingen 
and  Leipzig,  he  became  attached  to  the  university,  trav- 
elhng  after  awhile  to  England,  Holland,  and  Switzer- 
land, when  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  Schiller's 
godparent.  In  1781  he  exchanged  his  academical 
duties  for  the  more  practical  ones  of  a  Konsistorial 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  l6i 

advocat.  Two  years  later  he  had  gone  to  Dresden  as 
member  of  the  Upper  Consistory  there.  The  second 
anonymous  friend,  a  warm  admirer  of  our  poet,  was 
Ludwig  Ferdinand  Huber,  whose  father  was  French 
Lector  at  the  Leipzig  University,  and  had  earned  no 
shght  fame  by  his  French  translations  of  German 
poetry.  Huber,  the  son,  had  also  done  work  in  this 
way ;  he  chiefly  occupied  himself  with  English  and 
French  literature.  It  seems  to  have  been  he  who  sent 
off  the  packet,  and  who  gave  the  address  whence  it 
came.  The  friends  loved  two  sisters,  Minna  and  Dora 
Stock,  daughters  of  a  well-known  engraver.  Minna 
had  worked  for  the  poet  a  costly  letter-case,  while  Dora 
had  etched  portraits  on  parchment  of  herself  and  of  the 
three  others. 

"  Such  a  gift,"  said  Schiller,  writing  to  Bauerbach, 
"  is  to  me  greater  reward  than  the  world's  loud  note  of 
praise ;  it  is  the  one  sweet  guerdon  for  a  thousand  mo- 
ments of  sadness.  And  if  I  go  farther,  if  I  reflect  that 
maybe  there  are  hke  circles  in  the  world,  where,  though 
unknown,  I  still  am  loved,  and  where  my  presence 
would  be  welcome ;  when  I  think  that  after  a  century 
and  more,  e'en  though  I  am  long  turned  to  dust,  men 
will  bless  my  memory,  and,  though  in  the  grave,  I  still 
shall  have  their  tears  and  their  esteem,  then,  oh,  dear- 
est one,  then  I  am  glad  to  be  a  poet ;  I  am  reconciled 
with  God  —  am  content  to  bear  the  many  ills  that  are 
my  lot."  Yet  he  had  no  wish  to  show  his  admir- 
ers how  depressed  was  his  state ;  he  could  tell  them 
of  no  fresh  work  achieved ;  this,  therefore,  kept  him 
from  sending  them  any  thanks.  Shortly  afterward  it 
chanced  that  Frau  von  Lengenfeld,  with  her  two 
daughters,  came  to  see  him  from  Eudolstadt.  Caro- 
line, the  elder,  was  engaged  to  a  Herr  von  Beulwitz ; 
Charlotte  was  to  be  one  of  the  Duchess  of  Weimar's 
ladies-in-waiting.  Perhaps  Schiller  may  then  have 
thought  that  it  was  she  who  would  bring  happiness 


i62  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

iuto  his  life.  While  on  the  journey  she  had  seen  his 
parents  at  Solitude.  The  Lengeufelds  had  read  "  The 
Eobbers,"  as  well  as  some  of  liis  poetry,  so  they  were 
pleased  to  know  the  family,  altliough,  of  course,  the 
acquaintance  was  but  a  shght  one.  In  Lotte's  journal 
there  is  no  mention  whatever  of  the  visit.  Schiller 
was  from  home  when  they  called,  and  he  went  to  see 
them  in  return  at  tlieir  hotel. 

He  was  ever  hoping  that,  before  September  came, 
Dalberg  would  renew  his  contract  with  him.  He 
thought,  too,  of  marriage,  of  making  Margareta  Schwan 
his  wife.  That  this  or  the  like  was  in  his  mind  may 
be  gathered  from  what  he  wrote  to  the  baroness  on 
June  2d : 

"  Could  I  but  tiiid  a  maiden  dear  enough  to  m  j 
heart !  Or  would  that  I  could  take  you  at  your  word, 
and  become  your  son !  Eiches  your  Lotte  would  cer- 
tainly never  have,  but  in  truth  she  would  be  happy." 

This  seems  to  imply  a  withdrawal  rather  than  an 
advance  of  any  claims  upon  Lotte's  love.  He  leaves 
the  letter  unsealed  for  a  week,  and  then  laughs  at  his 
stupidity,  which  he  begs  the  baroness  will  excuse.  Of 
course,  too,  he  is  now  no  longer  jealous  of  Winkelmann  ; 
if  travelling  to  Meiningen,  he  says  he  would  be  very 
pleased  to  spend  some  days  with  him. 

In  sending  Dalberg  an  account  of  the  performances, 
he  makes  double  resolve  to  devote  himself  heart  and 
soul  to  "  Carlos."  For  this  was  to  be  on  bolder,  grander 
scale ;  to  him  the  author,  as  also  to  the  theatre  for 
which  he  wrote,  it  would  bring  fame  swifter,  surer,  than 
any  earned  by  his  three  "  domestic  tragedies."  Yet  he 
leaves  it  to  Dalberg  to  say  which  subject  he  shall  now 
choose ;  by  this,  perhaps,  he  seeks  to  calm  all  fear  as 
to  the  completion  of  "  Don  Carlos."  On  June  20th  his 
"  Itobbers  "  was  again  played,  but  to  an  empty  house, 
while  both  the  other  pieces  were  completely  shelved.  He 
was  still  deeply  intent  upon  bringing  out  a  dramatic 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  163 

journal ;  one  of  the  first  things  to  fill  its  pages  would 
be  the  essay  upon  the  stage  in  its  relation  to  morals, 
read  on  June  6th  before  the  Deutsche  Gesellschaft.  It 
had  more  of  rhetoric  than  of  argument,  this  attempt  to 
show  that  the  drama  might  rank  with  the  law  and  with 
rehgion  in  its  influence  upon  morals.  If  ever  Germany, 
so  he  said,  should  acquire  a  really  national  theatre,  she 
would  become  a  nation.  He  ends  by  calling  the  stage 
that,  among  other  institutions,  which  educates  while  it 
amuses,  which  distracts,  and  yet  attracts  the  mind, 
which  is  at  once  a  pastime  and  a  school  for  culture, 
having  but  one  aim,  one  end  —  the  perfection  of  man- 
kind. 

He  entered  hopefully  upon  the  last  half  of  the  year ; 
fate  seemed  to  have  brighter  things  in  store  for  him. 
In  addition  to  the  duties  that  bound  him,  he  even 
looked  to  find  time  to  pass  his  medical  examination 
at  Heidelberg,  and  to  settle  down  at  Mannheim  as  a 
doctor.  On  the  2d  of  July,  he  submitted  to  Dalberg, 
at  his  request,  the  prospectus  of  a  Mannheim  dramatic 
journal.  Being  modelled  on  that  of  Lessing,  it  was  to 
aim  at  immortalising  the  Mannheim  stage ;  it  was 
to  complete  the  great  work  of  making  it  supreme,  of 
strengthening  its  national  fame.  In  order  to  conduct 
the  undertaking  worthily,  and,  as  he  said,  "  with  the 
full  measure  of  his  powers,"  he  proposed  that  the  man- 
agement should  pay  him  a  yearly  salary  of  fifty  ducats, 
while  he  would  furnish  the  committee  with  a  certain 
number  of  gratis  copies.  He  begged  for  an  early  an- 
swer, in  order  to  make  the  necessary  arrangements 
without  delay.  The  first  number  was  to  appear  in 
August.  But  Dalberg's  refusal  crushed  all  his  fair 
prospects  at  a  stroke.  On  the  16th  his  sister,  with 
Eeinwald,  arrived.  They  were  the  last  he  could  have 
wished  to  witness  his  state  of  depression  and  gloom ; 
still  he  gave  them  welcome,  and  in  their  company 
revisited  Heidelberg  and  Schwetzingen.     Eeinwald  had 


i64  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

intentions  of  marrying  Christophine  ;  this  Schiller,  who 
knew  how  slender  were  his  means  and  how  feeble  his 
health,  could  only  deplore.  These  days  were  sad  ones 
for  thorn  all ;  Reinwald  can  but  look  back  upon  them 
"  with  dislike  and  dread."  After  he  had  gone,  the 
sister  stayed  on  for  a  time  with  her  brother.  His 
landlady  took  charge  of  her,  the  good  Frau  Holzel, 
who  well  knew  of  her  lodger's  despairing  state.  While 
here,  too,  Christophine  was  able  to  grow  more  intimate 
with  Margareta  Schwan.  On  a  sudden,  all  Mannheim 
was  stunned  by  the  dreadful  news  of  Caroline  Beck's 
death.  While  acting  in  "  Emilia  Galotti,"  she  had 
met  with  an  accident.  She  died  soon  after,  from 
concussion  of  the  brain,  having  given  birth  to  a 
daughter. 

As  the  month  ended,  the  poet's  state  of  perplexity 
grew  more  and  more  terrible.  Within  the  next  fort- 
night, he  writes  to  his  father  tliat  "  all  lay  in  the 
balance."  If  no  help  came,  he  must  seize  upon  some 
desperate  remedy.  According  to  Streicher,  the  long- 
standing debt  to  the  printer  of  his  "  Eobbers "  was 
what  now  harassed  him.  The  person  who  had  stood 
surety  for  payment,  and  who  hitherto  had  been  able  to 
appease  the  duns,  was  now  at  last  forced  to  escape. 
Fleeing  to  Mannheim,  he  had  there  been  arrested. 
Schiller  must  in  common  honesty  pay  the  sum  de- 
manded ;  it  was  lent  to  him  by  Holzel,  his  landlord, 
who  was  in  easy  circumstances.  Yet  this  only  saved 
him  from  the  strait  of  the  moment;  his  debts  were 
numerous ;  he  had  no  money ;  and  what  if  Dalberg 
should  decline  to  renew  his  contract  ?  Such  a  thing 
was  but  too  possible. 

In  these  days  Frau  von  Kalb  had  moved  to  Mann- 
heim, where  she  was  expecting  her  confinement.  Her 
husband,  the  major,  came  thither  three  times  in  the 
week.  Schiller  grew  now  more  intimate  with  Char- 
lotte, who,  while  at  Landau,  had    given  him  various 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  165 

commissions  to  execute.  Both  were  fascinated  by  a 
performance  of  "  King  Lear,"  given  on  the  19th  with 
Iffland  in  the  title-part,  which  he  played  in  masterly 
fashion.  Schiller  praised  him  in  a  stirring  critique 
which  he  sent  to  the  poet  Gockingk  for  insertion  in  his 
journal.  He  offered  his  services  as  contributor  to  this 
paper,  the  Journal  von  und  fur  Beutschland.  Thus  the 
critique  ends : 

"  There  is  nothing  to  remind  us  that  this  Lear  is  the 
identical  Franz  Moor  who,  two  months  ago,  thrilled  us 
with  awe  and  wonder.  In  sooth,  it  rests  with  him 
alone  to  fix  the  lines  by  which  he  means  to  reach 
greatness ;  maybe  he  needs  but  a  discerning  public  in 
order  to  call  back  the  shade  of  Garrick,  the  unmatched." 

There  was  at  that  time  a  strong  prejudice  against 
Schiller  personally  among  a  large  section  of  the  Mann- 
heim public.  Goethe's  farce  of  "  The  Black  Man  "  had 
beeu  given  on  August  3d.  The  character  in  it  of  a 
playwright,  which  Iffland  acted,  was  supposed  to  be 
a  travesty  of  our  poet.  Iffland  himself  wrote  to  Dal- 
berg  about  this. 

"  We  ought  never  to  have  produced  the  piece,"  he 
says,  "  out  of  respect  for  Schiller's  feelings.  It  is  we, 
we  who  have  cast  the  first  stone  at  him,  before  a  pubhc 
by  whom  he  is  but  partially  understood.  I  scrupu- 
lously avoided  making  the  portrait  a  close  one  [he 
wore  a  blue  steel-buttoned  overcoat,  dirty  white  stock- 
ings, and  buckle-shoes],  yet  everybody  eagerly  ac- 
cepted it  as  Schiller's.  From  this  alone  we  may  see 
how  sure,  how  unerring  is  his  art,  from  the  utter 
invulnerability  of  this  great  man.  Yet  how  can  he 
now  stand  forth  with  his  works  ?  How  shall  the 
people  single  him  out  for  praise,  now  that  a  road 
seems  open  to  cover  him  with  ridicule  ? " 

Even  Mai,  the  doctor  in  attendance  at  the  theatre, 
had  written  an  essay  denouncing  pieces  like  "  The 
Robbers  "  as  ruinous  to  those  who  acted  in  them. 


i66  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Dalberg  was  not  expected  in  Mannheim  until  the 
29th ;  Schiller  did  his  utmost  to  propitiate  hiin.  He 
tells  him  on  the  24tli  how  anxiously  he  is  waiting  for 
his  return.  In  "  Carlos  "  he  considers  that  he  has  got 
a  splendid  subject.  Tragedy  was  probably  the  form 
of  drama  in  which  he  would  excel ;  in  other  branches 
he  might  be  surpassed.  He  was  now  more  a  master 
of  the  verse,  and  this  would  give  to  the  play  much 
worth  and  much  effect.  He  had  been  reading  the 
French  dramatists,  not  only  to  widen  his  knowledge 
and  to  enrich  his  imagination,  but  also  as  an  aid 
toward  seizing  the  juste  milieu  between  French  and 
English  art.  With  time,  too,  he  hoped  to  transplant 
the  best  of  such  plays  to  native  soil,  and  for  G-ermany 
this  would  be  of  high  benefit.  He  had  now  got  back 
his  full  power  for  work,  and  would  make  up  for  the 
long  time  —  almost  a  year  —  that  he  had  lost.  Albeit 
ill-health  and  ill-humour  had  often  fought,  and  fought 
successfully,  against  his  best  will  and  intention,  he  was 
no  mere  shadow-chaser,  no  builder  of  empty  schemes ; 
this  was  not  in  his  character.  Still  Dalberg,  already 
biased  against  him,  found  it  passing  strange  that  Schil- 
ler, while  he  tells  him  all  this,  should  at  the  same  time 
announce  his  resolve  to  become  a  doctor,  for  which 
profession  he  was  already  preparing  himself.  In  such 
a  case  what  help  could  he  expect  from  him  for  the 
theatre  ?  Decidedly,  the  contract  could  not  be  re- 
newed. And  so,  before  his  return,  which  was  delayed 
beyond  the  time,  he  expressed  through  Doctor  Mai  his 
approval  of  the  poet's  resolve.  Schiller  trusted  in 
Dalberg  so  implicitly  that  he  only  took  this  to  be  a 
sign  of  sincere  and  deep  interest.  He  therefore  asks 
him  point-blank  to  continue  paying  him  his  salary  for 
the  next  year,  although  he  could  not,  as  before,  give 
him  his  ser^dces.  If  in  this  time  he  should  succeed 
in  establisliing  himself  at  Mannheim  as  a  physician, 
he  could  easily   make  amends  for  his  idleness,  and 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  167 

Dalberg  would  hold  the  sole  copyright  of  all  that  he 
might  write. 

"  As  I  could  uot  so  suddenly  renounce  play- writing 
and  the  drama,  I  can  always  vouch  to  produce  ooie 
important  work  (i.  e.  in  every  year) ;  and  my  plan 
with  regard  to  a  dramatic  journal  shall  be  carried  out 
in  complete  accordance  with  your  wishes."  But  Dal- 
berg, with  an  eye  to  himself  and  his  own  needs,  was 
not  inchned  to  put  much  faith  in  a  poet  oscillating 
between  medicine  and  the  drama ;  probably  he  would 
fail  no  less  in  the  one  branch  than  in  the  other ;  his 
powers  were  all  spent ;  he  deemed  him  a  genius  of  the 
unstable,  ne'er-do-weel  order.  What  he  wanted  for  his 
theatre  was  a  writer  of  fertility  and  strength ;  and  this 
he  believed  he  possessed  in  Iffland,  who,  having  less 
genius,  might  for  that  very  reason  be  the  more  efficient. 
Thus  Schuler  found  himself  cut  adrift  without  either 
place  or  pay,  at  a  time  when  he  should  have  had  com- 
plete and  untroubled  leisure  in  which  to  work  at  "  Don 
Carlos."  Though  plunged  in  the  very  depths  of  de- 
pression, he  yet  did  not  venture  to  show  his  distress 
either  to  Frau  von  Kalb,  to  Schwan,  or  to  any  of  his 
friends  at  Leipzig.  His  pride  forbade  this.  Ifflaud 
kept  staunch  to  him ;  he  believed  that  "  Don  Carlos " 
would  prove  to  be  of  high  excellence  ;  and  that  success 
was  also  in  store  for  an  adaptation  of  Shakespeare's 
"  Timon,"  begun  by  Schiller  since  his  dismissal.  It  is 
true  that  Iffland  had  advised  Dalberg  not  to  produce 
"  The  Eobbers  "  and  "  Fiesco  "  during  the  coming  win- 
ter. But  this  was  because  the  public  disliked  these 
plays,  and  because  successive  performances  of  this  kind 
would  prove  too  great  a  tax  upon  the  company's 
powers. 

On  the  8th  of  September  Frau  von  Kalb  gave  birth 
to  a  son.  Two  days  later  her  husband  arrived  at  Lan- 
dau, and  in  the  next  night  a  dreadful  vision  well-nigh 
caused  her  death.     Schiller,   hearing  this,  is   said   to 


i68  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

have  speedily  despatched  a  doctor  to  the  house,  as  all 
in  waiting  on  the  patient  had  quite  lost  their  presence 
of  mind.  During  her  convalescence  the  major  brought 
Schiller  to  his  wife's  bedside.  Again  the  poet  made 
appeal  to  his  father,  who  proposed  that  he  should 
return  to  Solitude  and  prepare  for  his  examination. 
But  Schiller  could  not  possibly  consent  to  this.  His 
announcement  that  he  had  immediate  need  of  two 
hundred  or  three  hundred  gulden  caused  his  parejit 
the  utmost  anxiety,  who,  notwithstanding,  took  com- 
fort from  the  thought  that  God  in  his  wisdom  and 
goodness  had  chosen  this  means  of  convincing  Fritz 
that  all  our  own  power,  our  own  knowledge,  our  own 
hope  in  others  and  in  fortune's  favour,  is  at  best  vanity 
and  folly,  as  he  gives  help  to  those  alone  who  ask 
him  for  it  patiently,  sincerely.  "  Alas  for  him  who 
has  no  God  to  whom  he  may  flee  in  the  day  of  need  ! " 
Thus  writes  the  father,  in  a  letter  full  of  bitter  re- 
proach. Yet  to  show  his  son  how  keenly  he  felt  for 
him,  he  sent  him  two  louis  d'or.  These  he  had  had  to 
borrow ;  it  was  positively  the  last  help  he  could  give. 
But  Fritz  must  not  lose  heart ;  he  must  work  and 
wait,  submitting  to  God's  rule,  and  looking  humbly  to 
him  for  aid.  Instead  of  shunning  his  creditors,  he 
should  ask  them  to  grant  him  yet  further  patience ; 
and  in  particular  he  must  not  let  any  false  pride  keep 
him  from  those  of  his  friends  who  might  relieve  him, 
—  he  must  try  to  win  their  favour  and  good-will. 
When  writing  this,  the  father  had  Schwan  and  I)al- 
berg  in  his  mind ;  he  was  always  hoping  that  Fritz 
would  marry  Margareta,  of  whose  good  qualities  his 
son  had  often  spoken,  and  who  had  welcomed  Christo- 
phine  as  a  friend. 

How  Schiller  found  help  in  this  dire  extremity  is 
not  known.  Just  at  this  time  his  friendship  with 
Charlotte  became  a  closer  one,  and  the  ties  that  Hnked 
him  to  others  grew  proportionately  weaker.     For  Dal- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  169 

berg  had  cruelly  disappointed  him  ;  he  could  not  expect 
much  from  Schwan ;  even  Margareta  had  for  a  time 
caused  him  annoyance.  Of  course  he  could  not  wholly 
break  with  them ;  their  mutual  connection  with  the 
theatre  and  with  the  Deutsche  Gesellschaft  forbade  this. 
Nor  did  he  cease  to  have  friendly  dealings  with  Klein. 

Though  he  worked  on,  and  with  good  result,  at 
"  Don  Carlos,"  he  could  not  quickly  finish  the  piece, 
which  lie  found  ever  more  difficult  to  cramp  within 
the  narrow  limits  of  an  average  stage-play.  And  yet 
the  wish  to  give  to  friends  fresh  and  worthy  proof  of 
his  powers  urged  him  to  persevere.  Now  that  he  had 
lost  his  office  as  paid  playwright,  now  that  he  saw  him- 
self so  clearly  forsaken  by  the  theatre-going  public,  it 
behoved  him  to  take  fresh  courage,  to  strike  out  a  new 
road  toward  success.  He  would  become  a  journahst. 
He  had  thoughts  of  going  to  Berlin,  where  he  was  sure 
of  wide  sympathy ;  but  in  his  present  miserable  cir- 
cumstances this  was  impossible.  Perhaps  it  was  at 
this  time  that  he  changed  his  lodging.  Pichler  tells 
us  that  finally  he  moved  to  the  house  marked  D  4, 
No.  5  ;  it  has  since  been  rebuilt. 

Frau  von  Wolzogen  was  now  in  such  straits  herself 
that,  at  the  beginning  of  that  November,  she  was  forced 
to  remind  Schiller  of  his  debt.  He,  alas !  declared  his 
utter  inabihty  to  discharge  it.  His  illness,  lasting 
almost  a  year,  had  hindered  him  from  keeping  his 
word.  But  now  his  plans  were  ripe,  and,  if  nothing 
blocked  his  path,  his  future  was  assured ;  to  cripple 
him  now  Would  be  to  cripple  him  for  good  and  all. 

"  This  week,"  he  writes,  "  I  shall  announce  the  issue 
of  a  journal  to  be  published  by  subscription.  Help 
has  been  offered  to  me  from  various  quarters,  and  I 
feel  sanguine  of  success.  If  I  can  get  five  hundred 
subscribers  —  and  with  the  excellent  measures  adopted, 
I  shall  hardly  fail  to  do  this  —  my  certain  profit,  after 
deducting  all  expenses,  will  be  one  thousand  florins. 


lyo  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Besides  this,  I  shall  continue  to  receive  the  money 
which  my  plays  bring  me  in ;  all  depends  upon  my 
industry  and  my  health." 

However,  not  wishing  merely  to  restrict  himself  to 
promises,  he  enclosed  three  bills  falhng  due  at  differ- 
ent dates ;  these  would  completely  clear  off  his  debt 
by  the  end  of  1785  ;  God  would  assuredly  "keep  him 
in  health  for  the  achievement  of  this  high  end." 

The  prospectus  of  the  new  journal  is  dated  the  11th 
of  November,  his  birthday.  It  appeared  as  an  adver- 
tisement in  the  December  number  of  the  Deutsches 
Museum.  At  Mannheim  there  was  already  a  Pfdl- 
zisches  Museum  ;  for  Schiller's  paper  the  more  compre- 
hensive title  of  Die  Rlieinische  Thalia  was  chosen.  All 
that  was  refining  to  the  moral  sense,  all  that  lay  within 
the  realm  of  the  beautiful,  all  that  could  purify  pas- 
sion, raise  the  taste,  and  ennoble  the  heart  —  this  all 
was  to  find  place  in  his  paper,  which  had  the  culture 
of  a  people  as  its  aim.  The  contents  were  to  be 
divided  as  follows.  Firstly,  biograpliical  sketches  of 
remarkable  men  and  essays ;  secondly,  philosophy  of 
the  kind  needed  in  the  work-a-day  world ;  thirdly, 
studies  of  nature  and  of  fine  art  in  the  Pfalz ;  fourthly, 
the  drama  of  Germany,  and  especially  a  history  and 
chronicle  of  the  Mannheim  stage ;  as  his  connection 
with  this  latter  had  now  ceased,  his  judgment  would 
be  untrammelled,  unprejudiced ;  fifthly,  poetry,  lyrical 
and  elegiac,  also  detached  scenes  from  dramas ;  sixthly, 
critical  reviews  of  leading  men  and  of  important  books  ; 
seventhly,  personal  (i.  c.  editorial)  confessions  ;  eighthly, 
correspondence,  advertisements,  miscellanea.  Every 
two  months  a  number  of  some  190  pages  was  to 
appear.  The  subscribers'  names  were  to  be  printed  in 
full ;  this  was  a  means  of  expressing  gratitude  to  them 
for  their  sympathy  and  help. 

Many  prospectuses  were  now  sent  out  to  win  the  aid 
of  writers  of  note.     Not   only  from   old  friends  and 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  171 

schoolfellows,  such  as  Winkeluiauu,  was  this  asked; 
Eeinwald's  services  were  also  secured,  with  those  of 
Jacobi,  Gockingk,  and  others  whom  Schiller  merely 
knew  by  name.  Wieland  alone  was  not  of  their 
number.  In  Weimar,  one  Neumann,  an  actor,  had 
promised  help.  Subscriptions  were  to  be  received  by 
the  Eeichspost,  not  by  Schwan's  publishing  house, 
which  had  no  interest  in  the  sale  of  the  journal. 
While  Schiller  thus  anxiously  awaited  the  result  of 
this  printed  announcement,  he  sedulously  strove  to 
finish  the  first  act  of  his  new  drama.  It  was  set 
in  a  higher  key,  and  must  form  the  most  brilliant 
feature  of  the  opening  number.  On  the  one  hand, 
Frau  von  Kalb's  enthusiastic  praise  stimulated  him  ; 
on  the  other,  the  ambition  to  come  to  the  front  with 
work  that  should  be  worthy  of  his  name.  In  later 
years  he  liked  to  remember  how  helpful  to  his  poetic 
powers  had  been  this  intercourse  with  Charlotte  von 
Kalb,  and  how  the  character  of  the  queen  in  "  Don 
Carlos  "  had  in  a  measure  been  suggested  by  her  own. 
But  he  was  soon  to  discover  that  her  influence  brought 
him  small  benefit.  Afterward,  when  he  had  found  his 
heart's  darling,  he  deemed  Charlotte  quite  incapable  of 
genuine  feeling,  being  merely  stirred  at  times  to  mo- 
mentary warmth.  He  bids  one  ever  guard  against  her 
wary  intellect,  against  her  cold,  calculating  worldly 
wisdom,  which  severed  the  closest,  tenderest  ties  that 
might  bind  her  to  others.  She  always  misunderstood 
him,  he  says ;  and  from  these  bitter  words  of  passion 
we  learn  the  result  of  his  own  painful  experience. 
Charlotte  joined  him  in  dissuading  his  parents  from 
consent  to  Christophine's  marriage  with  Reinwald. 
We  may  see  this  from  the  father's  answer  to  a  letter 
of  the  poet's,  dated  21st  of  November —  a  letter  which 
shows  him  to  be  still  in  deep  agitation,  if  yet  more 
hopeful  than  before.  It  greatly  gladdened  him  that, 
on  the  22d  of  this  month,  in  spite  of  Moritz's  adverse 


172  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

criticism  in  the  Voszische  Zeitung,  his  "  Plot  and  Pas- 
sion "  had  met  with  extraordinary  success  at  Berhu, 
where  it  had  been  given  five  times  within  the  month. 
And  this  was  the  more  gratifying,  now  that  at  the 
Mannheim  theatre  his  plays  were  set  aside  in  favour 
of  others.  Dalberg  even  had  dispensed  with  his  aid 
in  the  rearrangement  of  some  of  Shakespeare's  dramas, 
and  had  himself  undertaken  to  finish  the  adaptation  of 
"  Julius  Ctesar,"  upon  which  Schiller  had  first  been 
working.  His  adversaries  at  Mannheim  hkewise  found 
food  for  satire  in  the  weak  points  of  his  grandiloquent 
prospectus. 

And  though  this  was  lifting,  this  companionship  of 
Charlotte  and  her  husband,  neither  from  her  nor  from 
another  could  he  gain  that  rest  which  is  so  grateful 
to  the  heart ;  good  Streicher,  even,  had  httle  power  to 
calm  his  restless,  troubled  soul.  One  December  even- 
ing, when  exceptionally  low  and  dispirited,  he  thought 
of  those  friends  at  Leipzig,  whom  he  had  never  yet 
thanked  for  their  gift  sent  to  him  more  than  six 
months  ago.  A  sudden  impulse  prompted  him  to 
write  an  apology  for  his  neglect.  In  bitter  days, 
most  anguishing  to  look  back  upon,  he  had  been  kept 
from  his  resolve  to  reply  at  the  right  hour  to  their 
kindness.  But  it  was  the  resolve  alone  which  had 
faded  from  his  heart  —  not  his  gratitude.  Only  close 
knowledge  of  him  and  of  his  ways  could  serve  to  give 
them  some  faint  idea  of  the  regard  that  friends  had 
once  cherished  for  him.  "  I  have  enjoyed  few  pleas- 
ures on  earth  ;  but  —  and  it  is  my  proudest  boast,  this 
—  for  these  few  I  have  to  thank  my  heart."  He  sends 
them  the  prospectus  of  the  TJialia,  to  which  he  meant 
to  devote  his  whole  powers ;  were  it  not  for  pecuniary 
reasons,  his  talent  would  most  certainly  find  employ- 
ment in  a  higher  sphere  of  action  than  in  mere 
journalism. 

That  winter  Frau  von  Laroche,  Charlotte's    friend, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  173 

was  also  at  Mannheim.  She  failed  to  attract  Schiller ; 
she  could  have  but  httle  knowledge  of  all  that  filled 
his  soul.  Although  her  conversation  had  ease,  charm, 
her  way  of  toying  with  moral  things,  as  Charlotte 
phrased  it,  was  to  him  detestable.  She  says  nothing 
of  Schiller  in  her  letters  of  this  epoch.  The  Duke  of 
Weimar,  when  returning  from  Switzerland,  had  visited 
Laroche  and  his  wife  at  Mannheim,  and  had  invited 
them  both  to  the  court.  Passing  through  Mainz  and 
Frankfort,  he  went  on  to  Darmstadt,  where  he  was  to 
stay  for  some  time.  Charlotte  then  seized  upon  the 
plan  of  bringing  Schiller  into  closer  relation  with 
the  duke.  An  acquaintance  of  hers,  a  certain  Fraulein 
von  Wolzogen,  governess  to  the  Princess  Louise  of 
Mecklenburg,  was  then  at  Darmstadt  with  her  parents. 
Charlotte  gave  Schiller  a  letter  of  introduction  to  this 
lady,  who  was  to  help  in  getting  him  presented  at 
court,  where  he  should  recite  his  "  Don  Carlos."  He 
reached  Darmstadt  on  the  23d  of  December,  and  lodged 
at  the  Sun  Inn,  i.e.  No.  9  Schirmstrasse.  Through 
Fraulein  von  Wolzogen  he  was  received  at  court,  and 
gained  closer  acquaintance  with  the  sons  of  Prince 
Frederick  Louis.  On  the  evening  of  the  26th,  before 
the  duke  and  his  court,  he  read  out  the  opening  portion 
of  "  Don  Carlos."  He  kept  his  manuscript  in  Minna 
Stock's  embroidered  letter-case,  which  was  much  ad- 
mired by  the  hereditary  princess.  In  her  SchiUer 
found  a  noblewoman  without  equal.  The  distin- 
guished company  received  the  play  very  warmly,  and 
the  duke  passed  several  shrewd  criticisms  upon  it. 
Karl  August  took  great  interest  in  the  young  genius, 
and  asked  graciously  as  to  his  aims  and  wishes  for  the 
future.  SchiUer  was  thus  emboldened  to  confess  to 
him  how  valuable  he  would  hold  any  titular  honour ; 
he  even  disclosed  his  love  for  Margareta  Schwan. 
That  very  next  morning  the  duke  appointed  him  a 
councillor  of  Weimar  in  sign  of  his  regard. 


174  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

On  the  29th  Schiller,  thus  distinguished,  returned  to 
Mannheim,  where  the  printing  of  Thalia  was  now 
to  begin.  He  must  also  finish  the  last  act  of  "  Don 
Carlos."  He  was  at  that  time  on  friendly  footing  with 
Klein,  through  whose  instrumentality  the  Deutsche 
Gesellschaft  agi-eed  to  advance  him  132  gulden,  a  sum 
which  he  promised  to  repay  in  six  months.  After 
witnessing  a  performance  of  Klein's  "  Gunther,"  an 
operetta  then  very  popular,  he  writes  to  him  next 
morning :  "  Bon  jour.  Well,  my  dearest  friend,  how 
did  you  sleep  after  your  '  Gunther  ? '  It  made  my 
evening  a  very  pleasant  one.  Would  to  God  that  our 
fancy  and  imagination  were  not  thus  miserably  depend- 
ent (for  expression)  upon  the  pencil  of  actors  and  of 
singers !  Still,  the  poor  wretches  did  their  best." 
Enclosing  with  the  letter  a  promissory  note,  he  thanks 
Klein  warmly  for  his  kind  interest.  The  money  might 
be  given  to  the  bearer,  w^hose  honesty  and  stupidity 
were  on  a  par.  Twelve  days  later,  he  makes  vehement 
protest  to  Dalberg  against  the  slovenly  and  inaccurate 
way  in  which  "  Plot  and  Passion  "  was  being  acted  at 
the  theatre.  With  the  exception  of  Beck  and  of  the 
actresses,  all  played  in  an  excessively  careless  manner. 
Through  faulty  rehearsals,  his  piece  had  been  "  utterly 
mangled  to  shreds  ; "  in  place  of  his  own  lines,  not 
seldom  he  had  been  obliged  to  hear  nonsense.  Frau- 
lein  Baumann  alone,  whom  Iffland  had  drilled  in 
the  part,  carried  him  away  by  her  acting ;  after  the 
performance  he  expressed  to  her  his  sincere  thanks. 
His  feverish  self-consciousness  betrays  itself  in  the 
words :  "  To  me,  indeed,  the  thing  is  of  little  moment, 
for  I  think  I  may  say  that  hitherto  the  theatre  has 
gained  more  by  my  plays  than  my  plays  have  gained 
by  the  theatre.  I  shall  never  let  the  value  of  my  work 
depend  upon  this  last."  After  telling  him  that  in  his 
Thalia  he  intends  to  vent  his  opinion  upon  the  sub- 
ject at  gi-eater  length,  he  thus  ends :  "  A  poet  whose 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  175 

three  dramas  have  been  put  upon  the  stage,  among 
them  a  '  Eobbers,'  has,  as  I  hope  and  believe,  some 
right  to  resent  the  want  of  proper  respect."  And  well 
might  he  set  store  by  his  fame,  albeit  that  public  criti- 
cism had  not  spared  his  last  two  works.  Nevertheless, 
their  genius  had  won  for  them  a  place  upon  the  stage. 
In  the  Foets'  Almanac  for  1785  there  were  words  in 
high  praise  of  him.  "The  Robbers,"  so  it  said,  had 
more  glow,  more  fancy,  more  of  the  force  of  genius, 
than  Goethe's  "  Goetz."  "  In  this  sham  sentimental 
age  we  never  looked  to  have  a  '  Eobbers,'  a  '  Fiesco,' 
a  '  Plot  and  Passion.'  Hail  to  Schiller,  the  fiery 
Teuton !  May  Apollo  and  the  Muses  be  with  him, 
that  we  may  right  soon  have  fresh  work  from  his  pen. 
He,  Goethe,  Stolberg,  and  others  —  a  few  —  could,  so 
we  think,  restore  manliness  to  our  countrymen,  could 
make  them  more  capable  of  deeper  feeling."  Of  course 
from  this  date  none  of  his  plays  were  performed  in 
Mannheim.  "  The  Robbers  "  had  been  last  acted  there 
on  the  26th  of  December, 

The  printing  of  the  Thalia  now  rapidly  progressed, 
although  he  could  not  wholly  keep  to  the  original 
scheme  of  arrangement.  To  his  essay  upon  the  stage 
was  appended  a  "  Marvellous  Instance  of  a  Woman's 
Revenge."  This  was  an  exciting  tale  about  Madame 
de  Pommeray  that  Schiller  had  translated  from  the 
manuscript  of  Diderot's  "  Jacques  le  Fataliste,"  with 
which  Dalberg  had  furnished  him.  Third  in  order 
came  the  first  act  of  "  Don  Carlos."  He  asked  all 
readers,  and  in  especial  the  great  authors  of  Germany, 
whose  pupil  he  was,  for  their  opinion  to  be  given  with 
the  utmost  candour ;  it  would  help  him,  this,  when 
writing  the  conclusion.  If  critics  called  this  first 
portion  morbid,  unhealthy,  then  "  the  whole  sketch 
would  find  its  way  into  the  fire."  He  sent  Klein  the 
proofs  of  the  first  number,  asking  for  his  candid 
criticism. 


176  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

This  intimacy  with  Charlotte  ouly  heightened  his 
excitement  and  unrest.  At  heart  he  ever  yearned 
for  the  closer,  deeper  friendship  of  some  soul  that 
thoroughly  understood  his  nature.  Margareta  alone 
attracted  him,  yet,  in  such  a  position,  how  could  he 
dare  to  offer  her  marriage  ?  One  evenuig  —  it  was 
that  of  the  10th — when  all  his  acquaintances  had 
flocked  to  the  playhouse,  where  Klein's  "  Gunther " 
was  being  given,  he  felt  impelled  to  write  to  those 
Leipzig  friends,  whose  affectionate  letter  he  had  left 
nearly  a  month  unanswered.  He  confessed  how  deeply 
he  longed  for  their  society ;  how,  since  their  last  letter, 
the  thought  had  stayed  ever  in  his  mind :  "  These 
beings  belong  to  you,  as  you  to  them ; "  how,  too,  his 
heart  had  told  him  that  their  friendship  would  work 
the  long-looked-for  change  in  his  career.  But,  as  it 
chanced,  he  was  kept  from  finishing  the  letter  by  an 
unexpected  visit.  Seemingly  it  was  of  no  very  pleasant 
nature,  for  twelve  days  passed  ere  he  again  took  up  his 
pen,  while  "  without  and  within  him  revolution  reigned." 

"  I  can  stay  no  longer  here "  (i.  e.  in  Mannheim). 
Thus  he  writes  in  the  depth  of  his  despair,  seeing  all 
things  in  their  gloomiest  light,  magnifying,  exaggerat- 
ing his  misfortunes.  "  For  twelve  days  I  have  carried 
this  at  my  heart,  this,  and  the  resolve  to  go  out  of  the 
world.  Men,  circumstances,  earth,  heaven,  are  repug- 
nant to  me.  I  have  no  soul  here,  not  one,  even,  to 
fill  the  void  at  my  heart  —  no  friend,  nor  man  nor 
woman ;  while  from  that  which  perchance  might  be 
dear  to  me "  (here  Charlotte  is  meant)  "  I  am  shut  off 
by  my  position  and  by  les  convenances." 

He  was  freed  from  the  theatre  ;  it  was  necessary, 
too,  that  he  should  "negotiate"  personally  with  the 
Duke  of  Weimar ;  the  main  thing,  however,  was  that 
he  must  see  Leipzig  and  his  friends  tliere.  "  Oh,  my 
soul  thirsts  for  frcsli  sustenance,  for  letter  men,  for 
friendship,  attachment,   love.     I    must    come  to  you, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  177 

must  in  closer  converse,  in  the  firmest  bonds  of  amity, 
learn  again  to  draw  gladness  from  the  heart  within  me, 
to  bring  my  whole  being  into  hfe  and  action.  My 
poetic  vein  stagnates,  just  as  my  heart  has  grown 
parched,  among  those  with  whom  until  now  I  have 
lived.  It  is  you  who  must  give  it  warmth  again. 
With  you  I  would  be,  I  shall  be,  all  that  and  double 
—  three  times  —  what  I  once  was;  more  than  this, 
my  beloved  ones,  I  shall  be  —  happy."  Ay,  and  as 
though  afraid  that  the  friends  might  deter  him,  he 
remarks  that  he  has  already  made  irrevocable  declara- 
tion of  his  resolve  to  quit  Mannheim,  going  thence  in 
three  or  four  weeks  to  Leipzig.  In  explanation  of  the 
"  paroxysm  of  joy "  into  which  the  very  thought  of 
Leipzig  threw  him,  he  further  confesses  that :  "  Hitherto 
Fate  has  cramped  my  projects ;  my  heart  and  my  muse 
have  had  at  the  same  time  to  be  ruled  by  necessity. 
It  needs  but  this  revolution  of  my  destiny  to  make  me 
quite  another  man,  to  let  me  begin  to  be  a  poet." 
Should  fortune  show  him  but  the  faintest  favour,  he 
meant  to  make  Leipzig  a  lasting  place  of  abode.  A 
single  moment  might  serve  to  divert  his  schemes  into 
a  new  channel  leading  toward  success.  Despite  this 
enthusiasm  about  his  future  as  a  poet,  seemingly  what 
he  here  had  in  view  was  to  settle  in  Leipzig  as  a  doctor, 
with  Margareta,  maybe,  as  helpmate.  Before  answer 
could  reach  him  from  Leipzig,  he  tells  Huber  of  his 
embarrassed  state,  and  of  his  need  for  pecuniary  help. 
He  could  no  longer  continue  to  edit  the  Tlialia  ;  all  the 
petty  letter-writing  and  account-keeping  worried  him 
extremely ;  he  meant  to  transfer  the  journal  to  a  pub- 
lisher, even  though  by  so  doing  he  should  lose  a  few 
hundred  thalers  annually.  Helped  by  the  Duke  of 
Weimar,  he  hoped  to  get  his  formal  degree  as  doctor 
of  medicine.  But  in  order  to  leave  Mannheim  he 
needed  at  the  least  a  hundred  ducats ;  and,  beyond  the 
sale  of  the  first  number  of  TJialia,  which  would  scarcely 


178  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

bring  him  in  more  than  a  hundred  thalers,  he  had  no 
means  of  raising  such  a  sum.  He  could  not  appeal 
to  his  friends  and  acquaintances  in  Mannheim ;  the 
best  of  these  were  unable  to  give  him  help.  His  father 
depended  upon  the  money  that  he  was  earning,  "  Is  it 
not  possible,"  he  asks,  "  on  your  own  or  on  my  note  of 
hand,  to  borrow  some  three  hundred  thalers  or  so  from 
the  booksellers  or  the  Jews  ?  My  plan  is  as  follows : 
every  two  months  I  would  repay  tifty  thalers  from  the 
profits  of  Thalia  until  the  debt  were  cleared.  But  this 
payment  could  only  begin  with  the  third  number. 
According  to  my  entire  calculations,  my  yearly  income 
from  Thalia,  after  deducting  expenses,  would  be  from 
eight  to  nine  hundred  thalers."  When  speaking  after 
this  of  a  friend  upon  whom  he  had  counted,  and  who 
was  now  in  great  monetary  embarrassment,  owing  to 
a  loss  of  fortune,  it  must  undoubtedly  have  been  Char- 
lotte's husband  to  whom  he  referred. 

While  Schiller  was  thus  anxiously  waiting  for  a 
favourable  answer  to  his  request,  the  printing  of 
Thalia  reached  completion.  After  the  "  Don  Carlos  " 
extract  came  a  letter  by  a  Danish  traveller  upon  the 
Cabinet  of  Antiquities  at  Mannheim ;  and  this  was 
followed  by  a  short  "  Kepertorium "  of  the  theatre 
there,  from  the  1st  of  January  to  the  3d  of  March, 
together  with  critical  notices  upon  subjects  connected 
with  the  playhouse  and  its  management.  At  the 
close  were  printed  words  of  apology  that  many  of  the 
articles  promised  in  the  prospectus  had  in  the  present 
number  unavoidably  been  left  away.  The  dedication 
of  "  Don  Carlos  "  to  the  Duke  of  Weimar  is  dated  the 
14th  of  March. 

Meanwhile  Korner,  at  his  father's  death,  on  5th 
January,  had  inherited  a  small  fortune.  Part  of  this 
he  invested  in  the  publishing  business  of  his  friend, 
George  Joachim  Goeschen,  who,  coming  from  Bremen, 
had   recently   established   himself  in  Leipzig.      When 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  179 

sending  Schiller  the  needed  money,  Korner  used  Goe- 
schen  as  his  agent  in  the  matter,  writing  to  him  that 
he  wished  to  lend  this  sum  to  the  poet,  yet  it  must 
seem  as  though  offered  by  the  publishers  in  aid  of  the 
issue  of  Tlialia.  He,  Korner,  would  write  to  Schiller 
that  Goeschen,  who  had  money  of  his,  would  advance 
the  sum  in  exchange  for  a  bill ;  and  this  amount  would 
be  charged  to  his  account  in  case  they  should  not 
agree  as  to  the  conditions  respecting  the  Tlialia. 
Thus  delicately  did  he  give  Schiller  help  in  his  dis- 
tress, who  looked  upon  pubhshers  as  a  mere  race  of 
lucre-loving  Jews. 

Already,  on  .Tuesday  the  8th,  Charlotte,  writing 
to  Christophine,  tells  her  that  the  first  number  of 
Thalia  is  to  appear  in  that  week.  Some  of  its 
matter  she  had  read ;  specially  the  scenes  from  "  Don 
Carlos  "  deserved  the  regard  and  the  praise  of  all  those 
who  could  think  or  who  could  feel.  Great  changes, 
she  said,  had  been  wrought  in  the  poet's  temperament 
by  fate  and  by  experience.  Her  only  wish  was  that 
this  venture  of  the  Tlialia  might  succeed,  and  that  it 
might  draw  out  in  equal  measure  his  energy,  his  sin- 
cerity, and  his  genius.  She  had  never  ceased  to  hope 
great  and  good  things  of  him,  for  she  had  his  welfare 
most  thoroughly  at  heart.  It  never  seems  to  have 
crossed  her  mind  that  he  really  meant  to  leave 
Mannheim. 

The  first  number  of  Thalia  had  scarcely  been  pub- 
lished when  Bock  and  Madame  Eennschiib  met  the 
poet's  criticism  of  their  acting  by  indignant  abuse. 
On  the  19th  he  makes  complaint  of  this  to  Dalberg. 
Bock,  he  writes,  had  unblushingly  attacked  him  from 
the  stage,  had  loudly  vilified  him  in  the  most  plebeian 
fashion.  He  asked  Dalberg  to  grant  him  a  personal 
interview  of  half  an  hour.  The  director  wrote  back 
to  express  his  regret  that  by  such  cutting  remarks 
Schiller  should  have  irritated  the  actors ;  he  declined, 


l8o  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

however,  to  speak  with  him  upon  the  subject,  much  to 
the  poet's  mortiticatiou.  With  his  Leipzig  friends,  on 
the  other  hand,  his  relations  grew  ever  more  hopeful. 
Not  only  was  the  needed  money  promised  to  him  ; 
Goeschen  likewise  offered  to  publish  the  Thalia  upon 
favourable  terms.  Unfortunately,  these  three  hundred 
thalers  now  borrowed  did  not  help  him  to  keep  faith 
with  Frau  von  Wolzogen,  nor  would  they  cover  the 
cost  of  a  journey  to  Heilbronn,  where  he  could  bid 
farewell  to  those  at  home  before  setting  out  for 
Saxony. 

In  a  letter  to  Huber,  who  was  expecting  him  at 
Leipzig,  he  now  fully  stated  his  vdsh.  It  cost  him 
gi'eater  pains,  he  said,  to  straighten  his  domestic  diffi- 
culties than  to  plan  out  some  state  conspiracy ;  home 
had  no  happiness  for  him  without  some  dear  and  inti- 
mate friend,  who  was  ever  at  hand,  who  had  not  to  be 
sought  for  in  the  outside  world.  If  he  could  share  a 
lodging  with  Huber,  who  must  recommend  respectable 
people  to  him,  all  would  be  right  and  well. 

"  I  merely  need  a  bedroom,  which  at  the  same  time 
might  be  my  study ;  and  then  a  sitting-room.  Neces- 
sary furniture  to  me  would  be  a  good  chest  of  drawers, 
a  wiiting-table,  bed,  and  sofa ;  also  another  table  and 
some  chairs.  If  I  had  these,  nothing  else  were  want- 
ing to  my  comfort.  I  can't  hve  on  the  ground  floor 
nor  in  the  top  story ;  and  above  all  things,  my  win- 
dows must  not  look  out  upon  a  graveyard.  Loving 
humanity,  I  love  likewise  its  turmoil.  If  I  can't  com- 
pass it  thus  that  we  {i.  e.  the  five-petalled  clover-leaf) 
can  have  our  meals  together,  I  shall  dine  at  the  tahle 
d'hote  of  the  inn :  for  I'd  rather  fast  than  not  eat  with 
company  large,  or  else  specially  excellent.  .  .  .  No 
doubt  there  is  a  desperate  naivetS  about  all  this  that 
I'm  expecting;  it's  your  indulgence,  though,  that  has 
spoilt  me."  The  needed  money  just  reached  him  in 
time;  it  came  in  the  form  of  a  bill  falling  due  upon 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  i8i 

the  31st.  Dalberg,  in  a  letter  of  the  27th,  had  ex- 
pressed regret  that  Schiller  should  seemingly  have 
taken  offence  at  his  last  remarks ;  they  did  but 
embody  his  firm  conviction  that  written  criticism  of 
actors  or  of  singers  was  of  necessity  harmful  to  a 
theatre,  and  must  eventually  work  its  ruin.  He  had 
pointed  out,  too,  how  Lessiug  with  his  "  Dramaturgy  " 
had  exactly  experienced  that  concerning  which  Scliil- 
ler  now  made  complaint.  We  may  infer  that  Dalberg 
wished  to  see  him  before  his  departure  from  the  words 
—  "  However,  more  by  word  of  mouth."  The  parting 
with  Charlotte  was  a  painful  one.  For  long  past  her 
morbid,  highly  strung  temperament  had  strongly  fas- 
cinated him,  had  raised  him  by  its  contact ;  but  it  had 
destroyed  his  peace  of  mind  and  of  soul.  He  must 
have  been  strangely  moved  at  this  time  to  hear  that 
Laura,  his  early  love,  had  let  herself  be  led  astray  by 
a  young  student  of  rank.  Again,  it  was  a  grief  and 
shame  to  him  that  he  could  neither  answer  Frau  von 
Wolzogen's  urgent  request  for  payment,  nor  yet  visit 
her  at  Heilbronn.  His  father  had  to  beg  him  to  write 
to  her,  at  least,  if  quite  unable  to  return  any  portion 
of  the  loan.  He  took  affectionate  leave  of  Margareta, 
who  as  a  parting  gift  presented  him  with  a  letter-case 
of  her  own  making.  They  agreed  to  establish  a  corre- 
spondence ;  and  it  was  already  Schiller's  intention  to 
ask  from  Leipzig  for  her  father's  consent  to  their  union. 
His  sense  of  courtesy  alone  made  him  visit  Dalberg 
before  quitting  Mannheim.  Klein  was  about  to  go 
at  this  time  to  Vienna ;  they  parted  in  tears.  In 
Beck  Schiller  left  behind  him  a  valuable  friend ;  his 
relations  with  Iflfland,  however,  were  less  cordial  than 
before.  On  his  last  evening  he  stayed  with  faithful 
Streicher  until  midnight,  at  which  hour  they  sadly 
bade  each  other  farewell,  not  without  dim  forebodings 
that  fate  held  brighter  days  for  both  of  them  in  the 
future. 


i82  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

In  such  way,  after  nearly  two  years,  did  he  leave 
Mannheim  —  to  him  a  hateful  place  enough,  where  he 
had  but  known  new  trouble,  and  fallen  deeper  into 
debt.  He  left  it  with  "  Don  Carlos "  in  his  brain, 
with  Margareta  at  his  heart,  filled  full  of  longing  to 
give  greeting  to  those  friends  at  Leipzig  who  had  thus 
found  him  means  of  escape.  His  long  connectioa 
with  actors  and  the  stage  had  given  him  very  thorough 
insight  into  the  claims  and  needs  of  drama.  Such 
experience,  moreover,  had  its  useful  side,  even  though 
for  the  first  it  set  him  against  all  things  theatrical.  In 
Mannheim  many  a  bitter  disappointment  had  been  his ; 
still,  there  he  had  found  a  Charlotte  von  Kalb ;  there 
he  had  had  sight  of  that  ungoverned  soul,  consumed 
by  its  passion,  "warped  by  its  excess  of  sentiment; 
and  the  picture  had  been  helpful  to  him  when  plan- 
ning out  "  Don  Carlos."  Nor  did  he  go  from  the 
town  without  some  hope  that  it  was  gentle  Margareta, 
maybe,  who  was  destined  to  bring  gladness  into  his 
hfe  and  to  make  it  fair. 


Book   VI. 
In  Friendship's  Lap 


CHAPTER   I. 

FEOM    APRIL    TO    SEPTEMBER,  1785. 

After  a  journey  made  sadly  tedious  by  "  snow  and 
bog  and  rain,"  Schiller,  on  Sunday,  the  17th  of  April, 
reached  Leipzig,  "  shattered  and  broken,"  stopping  here 
at  the  sign  of  the  Blue  Angel.  And  yet  his  spirits  had 
not  deserted  him,  for  we  find  him  playfully  trying  to 
mystify  the  two  sisters,  Minna  and  Dora  Stock,  when 
introducing  himself  to  them.  Korner  was  at  that  time 
in  Dresden.  In  Huber  he  gained  knowledge  of  a  fine 
nature ;  but  the  poor  fellow,  under  the  rule  of  an  over- 
strict  mother,  had  been  kept  from  reaching  any  manly 
self-dependence.  Eigid  surveillance  had  made  him 
shy  and  irresolute  in  manner ;  his  betrothed,  too,  some 
five  years  older  than  himself,  and  gifted  with  much 
talent  both  for  art  and  raillery,  had  only  helped  to 
unsettle  his  character.  Schiller  at  first  took  lodgings 
at  the  Joachimsthal  cafe,  in  the  Hainstrasse.  He 
needed  change,  distraction,  after  the  strain  of  those 
last  days  at  Mannheim,  and  all  the  fatigues  of  his 
journey.  For  this  reason  he  plunged  straightway  into 
the  throng  and  bustle  of  the  Leipzig  Fair,  although 
this  time,  forsooth,  there  was  less  of  commotion  there 
than  he  had  imagined.  With  many  a  face  which 
passed  him  he  was  famihar.  Besides  Huber's  father 
he  met  Weisze,  who,  having  ceased  to  write  poetry,  was 
now  editing  children's  books,  and  had  issued  a  "  New 
Library  of  the  Fine  Arts."  Then,  too,  he  saw  the  cele- 
brated Capellmeister  Hiller,  Professor  Oeser,  the  artist 

i8s 


i86  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

who  was  on  close  terms  of  friendship  with  Goethe  and 
the  court  at  Weimar ;  Reinecke,  the  regisseur  of  the 
Dresden-Leipzig  theatre ;  and  Jiiuger,  the  comedy- 
writer.  With  the  last-named,  a  jovial,  merry  young 
fellow,  some  few  months  his  senior,  he  grew  more  inti- 
mate. Here  also  he  found  Sophie  Albrecht  and  her 
husband ;  liis  urgent  warning  to  her  to  leave  the  stage 
had  heen  seemingly  given  in  vain.  It  amused  him 
most  to  stay^  at  Richter's  coffee-house,  where  many  a 
citizen  and  stranger  met  together,  although  he  must 
soon  have  wearied  of  being  stared  at  like  some  wild 
animal  for  having  written  "  The  Robbers,"  of  being 
hailed  and  greeted  at  every  turn  by  countless  literary 
men,  who  felt  it  their  privilege  to  welcome  a  comrade. 
But  yet  amid  all  this  mighty  whirl  he  soon  felt  soli- 
tary and  alone,  for  he  had  a  goal  in  life  toward  which 
he  strove.  He  told  Schwan  on  the  24th  of  his  heart's 
desire,  of  the  wish  that  he  had  cherished  for  more  than 
a  year,  and  that  he  had  already  confided  to  the  Duke 
of  Weimar.  In  a  short  time  lie  intended  to  go  to 
GohHs,  where  he  would  work  ^nth  great  diligence  at 
"  Don  Carlos  "  and  the  journal  Jlialia,  at  the  same  time 
continuing  his  medical  studies  unobserved.  "  The  goal 
once  clear  for  me,  I  shall  press  toward  it  with  every 
effort  of  my  being.  Judge  yourself  whether  I  be 
hkely  to  reach  it  when  my  zeal  is  strengthened  by  a 
most  delightful  wish.  Two  years  yet,  and  then  my 
wliole  fortune  will  be  decided."  He  felt  already  so 
sure  of  Schwan's  comphance  that  he  wTote  to  his  father 
on  4th  May  that  a  piece  of  news  from  Mannheim 
was  in  store  for  them  both.  But  Schwan  considerately 
avoided  giving  a  refusal  by  pointing  out  that  his  daugh- 
ter's character  was  not  suited  to  that  of  the  poet  whom 
he  so  highly  honoured.  .  Thus,  too,  did  this  day-dream 
vanish.  Schwan,  it  is  said,  told  nothing  to  Margareta 
of  the  proposal.  Of  course  Schiller  could  no  longer 
write  to  her,  while  she,  again,  grew  uneasy  at  a  silence 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  187 

she  was  powerless  to  explain.  He,  in  the  meantime, 
was  ever  more  closely  circled  by  a  band  of  loving 
friends. 

Toward  Korner  he  was  drawn  by  all  the  force  of 
that  noble,  brave,  and  affectionate  soul.  Already  his 
first  letter  showed  him  something  of  that  within  his 
heart,  which  felt  only  complete  happiness  in  the  knowl- 
edge that  he  was  doing  all  the  good  that  lay  within 
his  power.  He  should  feel  this  happiness,  he  said, 
when  he  had  his  Schiller  at  his  side ;  they  would 
mutually  spur  each  other  on  to  strive  unflinchingly 
toward  their  high  ideal.  Such  a  voice  as  this  touched 
Schiller  strangely ;  he  had  never  heard  its  like  before. 
How  worthy  of  reverence  seemed  to  him  a  man  who, 
enabled  to  enjoy  the  gifts  of  fortune,  was  all  athirst 
for  deeds !  How  proud  to  feel  that  he  had  been  prof- 
fered such  place  at  his  side !  What  joy  to  be  certain 
that  Korner,  in  "  this  faithful,  brotherly  fashion," 
would  "  join  him  in  his  romantic  voyage  toward  truth 
and  fame  and  fortune ! "  He  longed  for  the  autumn, 
when,  after  Korner's  marriage  in  Dresden,  he  would 
hve  with  Huber,  and  enjoy  in  his  society  the  pleasures 
of  close  friendship  and  of  deep  mutual  sympathy. 
Then  he  meant  to  divide  his  time  into  three  portions : 
one  to  be  set  apart  for  the  poet ;  the  other  for  the  phy- 
sician ;  the  third  for  the  individual.  He  had  not  yet 
abandoned  medicine,  albeit  Schwan's  evasive  answer 
had  already  reached  him.  He  told  his  new  friend 
nothing  of  this  Margareta  episode,  now  to  be  wholly 
swept  from  his  memory.  Korner  gave  warm  assent  to 
the  proposals  in  his  soul-filled  letter ;  he  sealed  their 
bond  of  friendship  by  using  the  familiar  "  thou,"  in 
sign  that  they  were  as  brothers.  Meanwhile  Schiller 
had  moved  to  Gohlis,  some  little  distance  out  of  Leip- 
zig. Here  he  lodged  at  the  first  with  Endner  and  his 
two  stepsisters, 

Goeschen  returned  from  Vienna  at  the  close  of  May ; 


i88  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

he  had  come  back  by  way  of  Weimar,  transacting  busi- 
ness there  with  Wieland,  Bode,  and  Musteus.  Schiller 
also  formed  friendship  with  him,  and  they  lived  to- 
gether in  the  little  house  standing  next  to  Endner's, 
which  was  afterward  bought  in  1856  by  the  Schiller 
Society,  in  loving  remembrance  of  the  poet.  Jiinger 
also  was  at  Gohlis,  where  he  spent  one  of  the  merriest 
days  of  his  life  in  Schiller's  company.  Eeinhart 
joined  them  frequently,  a  young  landscape  painter  of 
great  promise,  and  with  him  the  poet  was  glad  to  be- 
come intimate.  Of  course  Schiller  often  went  into 
Leipzig,  where  he  had  dealings  with  Kunze,  a  mer- 
chant there,  a  great  friend  of  Korner's. 

On  the  1st  of  July  Korner,  his  bride  and  her  sister, 
Schiller,  Huber,  and  Goeschen  all  met  at  Professor 
Ernesti's  house  in  Kahnsdorf,  a  manor  some  five  miles 
out  of  Leipzig,  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Pleisze.  Hearty 
as  was  the  greeting  between  the  two  friends,  bound 
each  to  each  for  life,  they  could  at  such  a  time  find  no 
chance  for  confidential  talk,  as  Korner  specially  was 
in  so  large  request.  Next  morning  Goeschen,  Schiller, 
and  Huber  had  to  take  their  leave,  promising,  however, 
to  meet  the  ladies  that  following  afternoon,  whom 
Korner  was  to  conduct  for  part  of  the  way.  While 
returning  to  Leipzig,  as  the  three  spoke  of  their  hopes 
and  schemes  for  the  future,  Schiller  felt  thrilled  at  the 
thought  of  his  happiness  among  such  friends. 

"  My  heart  glowed  again,"  he  writes  to  Korner.  "  It 
was  no  flight  of  imagination  this ;  it  was  firm,  philo- 
sophical certainty  of  that  which  lay  before  me  in  the 
glorious  perspective  of  the  after  days.  Shame-struck, 
yet  not  wholly  crushed,  I  glanced  back  at  the  past, 
at  the  life  which  I  had  thus  hopelessly  squandered.  I 
felt  how  dauntless  were  my  powers,  how  abortive  the 
designs  (great  ones,  maybe)  which  nature  cherished 
respecting  me.  Half  had  been  ruined  by  the  senseless 
system  of  my  bringing  up  and  by  the  sullenness  of  Fate  ; 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  189 

the  other,  and  more  important  part,  by  myself."  Wliile 
in  this  glow  and  ferment  of  emotion,  he  had  sworn  to 
redeem  the  past;  and  his  enthusiasm  had  passed  to 
the  others  with  electric  speed.  In  Hiiber's  eyes  he 
read  Korner's  name,  which  at  that  instant  rose  invol- 
untarily to  his  lips.  From  their  meeting  glance  sprang 
forth  the  high  resolve  in  turn  to  help  each  other  for- 
ward toward  one  glorious  goal.  He  was  filled,  he  said, 
with  the  sense  of  their  close  union,  with  the  thought 
that  through  mutual  aid  alone  they  could  reach  great- 
ness, goodness,  fortune.  They  stopped  to  take  break- 
fast at  a  tavern  on  the  way,  drinking  to  Korner's  health 
with  tears  in  their  eyes.  "  Goeschen  declared  that  his 
glass  of  wine  felt  as  fire  in  the  veins,  while  with  burn- 
ing cheek  Huber  told  us  that  he  had  never  tasted  wine 
of  like  excellence  ;  and  I  thought  of  how  the  sacra- 
ment had  been  instituted,  and  of  those  words  '  Do  this, 
as  oft  as  ye  shall  drink  it,  in  remembrance  of  me.'  I 
heard  the  peal  of  organ ;  I  stood  before  the  altar. 
And  now  first  it  flashed  upon  us  that  the  day  was 
your  birthday." 

This  was  the  kind  of  extravagant  rhapsody  into  which 
he  fell,  through  thinking  of  their  joint  efforts  toward 
one  great  end,  toward  the  fulfilment  of  those  duties 
marked  out  for  them  by  nature.  He  had  never  yet 
found  a  friend  so  true,  so  high-principled  as  Korner ; 
and  his  heart  longed  to  give  utterance  of  its  joy. 

As  their  projected  excursion  was  hindered  by  the 
weather,  Schiller  could  not  keep  from  at  once  sending 
detailed  account  to  his  Korner  of  that  memorable  cele- 
bration of  July  the  2d.  But  there  was  another  cause 
for  his  writing :  he  needed  money ;  for  his  funds  were 
exhausted ;  and  before  three  months  were  past  he 
could  not  look  to  draw  any  help  from  the  Thalia 
subscriptions,  payable  through  the  Mannheim  Postal 
Agency,  if  indeed  he  were  not  cheated  of  these  alto- 
gether.    Then,  too,  he  wished  to  aid  Huber,  whose 


190  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

parents,  fearing  the  cost  of  his  outfit,  were  for  giving 
up  the  idea  of  his  entrance  into  the  diplomatic  service. 
Korner  was  but  to  advance  the  money,  and  Scliiller 
would  make  over  to  him  an  amended  edition  of  his 
three  dramas.  He  was  under  no  obligation  to  Schwan, 
who,  without  saying  a  word,  had  published  the  pieces 
in  fresh  form.  A  thoroughly  revised  edition  of  "  The 
Eobbers "  and  of  "  Fiesco "  would,  he  felt  sure,  be 
acceptable  to  the  public,  and  would  do  much  to  raise 
his  fame.  He  meant  to  give  new  effect  to  the  first 
named  play  by  an  appendix,  in  the  form  of  a  one-act 
piece,  to  be  called  "  The  Robbers'  Doom." 

Korner's  generosity  seemed  to  Schiller  without  its 
parallel,  unequalled  in  all  the  history  of  friendship. 
The  former,  writing  back,  reproached  him  gently  for 
hesitating  to  show  him  all  his  trouble,  and  for  not 
frankly  stating  the  sum  of  which  he  stood  in  need. 
What  he  in  that  moment  could  spare  he  at  once  sent ; 
if  more  were  wanted,  he  would  quickly  furnish  it. 
Schiller  must  let  him  enjoy  the  pleasure  of  saving  him 
for  a  year  at  least  from  the  necessity  of  earning  a  liv- 
ing;  it  was  a  pleasure  which  cost  him,  pecuniarily,  no 
sacrifice  whatever ;  when  tlie  j)()et  in  a  few  years  should 
have  reaped  his  golden  harvest,  he  might,  if  he  w^ould, 
repay  him  with  interest.  Korner  hoped  great  things 
of  the  "  Don  Carlos,"  which  Schiller  must  finish  com- 
pletely at  his  ease ;  as  to  the  new  edition  of  his  plays, 
the  venture  seemed  a  likely  one,  if  it  only  did  not  keep 
him  from  present  work.  It  were  best  for  his  own 
benefit  to  publish  in  commission  with  Goeschen ;  he, 
Korner,  would  meet  the  expenses  of  printing.  Schiller 
answering  to  this  letter,  writes : 

"  Your  friendship  and  your  kindness  open  up  to  me 
an  Elysium.  Through  you,  beloved  Korner,  I  may 
perhaps  yet  become  what  I  despaired  of  ever  being. 
As  my  powers  ripen,  so  will  my  happiness  increase ; 
and  near  you,  through  you,  I  look  to  develop  them. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  191 

These  tears  that  here,  on  the  threshold  of  my  new 
career,  I  shed  in  gratitude,  in  honour  to  you,  these 
tears  will  fall  again  when  that  career  is  ended.  If  I 
should  become  that  of  which  I  now  dream,  who,  then, 
happier  than  you?  A  friendship  having  such  an  aim 
in  view  is  a  friendship  that  can  know  no  ending.  Do 
not  destroy  this  letter.  Ten  years  hence,  maybe,  you 
will  read  it  with  strange  emotion  ;  and  in  the  grave 
you  will  softly  slumber  thereon." 

How  sharp  the  contrast  between  this  morbid  en- 
thusiasm and  Korner's  calm,  sure  conviction  that  it 
behoved  him  to  support  a  talent,  harassed  by  outward 
cares,  as  that  in  Schiller  he  had  found  a  friend  who 
would  quicken  liis  own  zeal  for  action  ! 

Following  Korner's  wish,  the  poet  for  the  first  kept 
on  working  solely  at  "  Don  Carlos,"  and  there  was  no 
further  thought  of  a  new  edition  of  his  other  plays. 
However,  he  promised  Goeschen  to  carry  on  the 
Thalia  until  the  close  of  September,  for  he  must 
keep  faith  with  the  pubhc.  The  first  number  was  to 
be  reprinted.  The  Mannheim  Postal  Agency  still  with- 
held the  subscriptions  which  had  been  paid  to  it  for 
him.  Goeschen's  fee  was  to  be  at  the  rate  of  two  louis 
d'or  per  sheet.  The  Duke  of  Weimar  had  not  ac- 
knowledged the  receipt  of  the  first  number,  but 
Wieland  had  written  back  his  judgment  of  the  "  Don 
Carlos  "  excerpt.  In  a  long  critique,  dated  the  8th  of 
May,  he  recognised  Schiller's  very  great  gifts,  though 
he  saw  in  his  work  an  immaturity,  a  want  of  balance. 
Much  he  blamed  rightly ;  yet  often,  too,  he  failed  to 
seize  the  author's  meaning.  It  was  not  his  intention, 
however,  to  notice  the  Thalia  in  his  Mercur,  while 
the  duke  wished  to  wait  for  the  succeeding  portion 
of  the  play  before  sending  SchiUer  his  thanks. 

It  was  at  this  time  that  Goeschen  one  evening 
brought  to  him  a  literary  man  who  had  once  keenly 
wounded  him  by  a  virulent  critique  of  his  drama,  "  Plot 


192  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

and  Passion."  This  was  Professor  Moritz,  a  friend  of 
IfHand's  and  the  author  of  "  Antou  Reiser."  Schiller 
gave  him  no  very  cordial  welcome ;  but  when  the  first 
heat  of  his  resentment  had  cooled,  and  when  Moritz, 
whose  objections  the  prodigious  applause  of  a  Berlin 
public  had  long  since  extinguished,  made  frank  apology 
for  so  intemperate  an  attack,  without,  however,  chang- 
ing his  original  opinions,  then  Schiller  held  out  the 
hand  of  reconciliation.  Moritz  was  a  man  of  mind, 
fallen,  though,  on  evil  days ;  one  who  had  grappled 
more  terribly  even  than  Schiller  with  an  adverse  fate. 
They  passed  a  happy  evening  together,  and  the  next 
morning  was  given  to  enthusiastic  converse  upon  the 
art  they  each  loved.  Schiller  read  out  to  his  com- 
panion portions  of  the  "  Don  Carlos,"  to  which  his 
whole  heart  and  being  clove. 

Sunday,  the  7th  of  August,  was  Korner's  wedding- 
day,  and  Schiller's  gift  was  a  pair  of  urns,  the  emblem 
and  memento  of  perpetuity.  He  also  wrote  some  lines 
in  honour  of  the  bride  and  bridegroom ;  but  these  were 
of  small  poetic  worth.  At  five  o'clock  that  afternoon 
the  marriage  ceremony  was  performed  at  Korner's 
country-seat,  where  his  most  intimate  friends  had 
joyfully  assembled.  After  a  few  days,  when  Dora 
and  her  husband  started  for  their  wedding  tour,  Schil- 
ler and  Huber  accompanied  them  on  horseback  as  far  as 
the  village  of  Stauchitz.  While  riding  back,  the  poet 
slipped  from  the  saddle,  crushing  his  right  hand  in  the 
fall.  This  so  disabled  him  that  more  than  three  weeks 
went  by  before  he  could  tremblingly  put  pen  to  paper, 
when  he  first  wrote  to  Korner,  the  friend  for  whom  he 
longed.  If  some  slight  mark  upon  his  hand  were 
always  to  remain,  he  said  that  he  would  heartily  wel- 
come it,  as  a  lasting  remembrance  of  his  friend's  joy- 
ful entry  into  Dresden.  His  own  life  at  Gohlis  was 
now  "  hermit-hke,  sad  and  empty,"  particularly  as  the 
bleak  autumn  weather  had  set  in  before  its  time.     He 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  193 

felt  powerless  to  do  any  fresh  work.  It  caused  him 
some  distraction,  however,  to  dictate  the  acting  version 
of  "  Fiesco  "  to  an  amanuensis,  as  the  play  was  soon  to 
be  given  at  Leipzig.  The  rest,  the  leisure,  the  mood 
which  must  absolutely  be  his,  if  he  would  produce 
work,  were  alone  to  be  found  when  with  friends  at 
Dresden.  He  asks  if  he  may  come  thither,  and 
Korner  at  once  invites  him.  Doctor  Albrecht  was 
then  starting  for  Dresden,  and  at  his  suggestion 
they  agreed  to  travel  together  by  the  extra  post. 
Schiller  is  glad  to  leave  Gohlis  thus  hurriedly,  for  it 
will  spare  him  "  the  trying  situation  of  bidding  several 
good  souls  farewell."  At  four  o'clock  on  the  morn- 
ing of  September  11th,  he  sets  out  in  feverish  excite- 
ment. On  repassing  the  places  where  he  had  lately 
been  in  company  with  the  bride  and  bridegoom,  he 
greets  them  "  with  all  a  pilgrim's  reverential  awe." 
He  cries  aloud  in  rapture  at  first  sight  of  the  Elbe 
emerging  from  the  mountains.  The  scenery  around 
this  river  had  the  more  charm  for  him  from  its  resem- 
blance to  the  "  wrestling-ground  of  his  early  poetic 
childhood."  At  midnight,  crossing  the  great  bridge, 
he  drove  into  Elbflorenz ;  and  amid  the  many  build- 
ings his  heart,  so  it  seemed,  would  needs  point  out  the 
dwelling  of  his  bosom  friend.  But  for  a  night,  at  least, 
an  inn  must  give  him  shelter  ;  and  at  the  Golden  Angel, 
No.  4  Wilsdrufferstrasse,  he  rested  after  his  long  day 
of  travel. 


CHAPTER  11. 

FROM    SEPTEMBEK,    1785,   TO   FEBRUARY,    1787. 

Rain  fell  in  torrents  next  morning,  as  Schiller,  in  a 
chair  borne  by  two  porters  in  canary-coloured  livery, 
was  carried  to  Friiulein  Faust's  house.  No  14  Kohlen- 
markt,  now  No.  4  Kornerstrasse.  Here  both  the 
ladies  welcomed  hiiu  warmly ;  and  Korner,  coming 
home  at  one  o'clock  from  the  Konsistorium,  met  his 
beloved  friend  with  open  arms.  Huber's  health  was 
drunk  in  a  bumper  of  good  Rhenish ;  and  after  dinner 
Korner  played  on  the  harpsichord  so  touchingly  that 
Schiller  saw  in  his  music  a  source  of  lofty  inspiration. 

At  five  in  the  afternoon  they  drove  to  Korner's  seat 
near  Loschwitz,  a  village  within  little  distance  of  Dres- 
den on  the  banks  of  the  Elbe.  Here  they  spent  the 
beautiful  autumn  days  together.  The  house  was  a 
spacious  one,  standing  in  a  pretty  little  garden  at  the 
foot  of  the  mountain,  while  at  the  top  was  a  summer- 
house,  which  commanded  a  magnificent  view  of  Blase- 
witz  opposite,  and  of  the  far  heights  of  the  Saxon 
Switzerland.  Already  on  that  first  evening  the  talk 
turned  upon  philosophy.  Korner  felt  an  impulse  for 
work  in  the  sphere  of  science,  while  Schiller  gave  all 
his  care  to  "  Don  Carlos,"  though  he  was  not  unmind- 
ful of  continuing  the  Thalia.  At  Loschwitz  he  heard 
from  Christophine  that,  after  mature  thought,  she  had 
given  Reinwald  her  hand.  In  the  same  straightforward 
way  that  he  had  disapproved  of  the  match,  he  now 
sent  to  her  his  brotherly  blessing.  And  with  it  goes 
the  regret  that  his  parent  will  not  admit  that  his  son  in 

194 


Schiller  w  Loschwit{ 

Photogravure  from  the  paintinc  by  F   Kirchbach 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  195 

losing  fatherland  has  really  won  all,  and  three  years  of 
youth  alone  had  been  the  price  of  a  fame  that  was  now 
general ;  he  looked  back  joyfully  to  his  past  life  ;  he 
felt  full  of  courage  for  the  future.  Serious  though  the 
step,  it  had  been  worth  taking  if  only  for  the  gain  of 
so  many  noble,  grand  men.  During  building  oper- 
ations at  the  house,  he  went  into  a  little  one  close  by, 
where  the  gossip  of  some  neighbouring  washerwomen 
disturbed  him  while  writing  the  scene  between  Carlos 
and  the  Princess  Eboli.  He  vented  his  irritation  in  a 
humourous  petition  addressed  by  a  dilapidated  tragedy 
writer  "  to  the  Kornerian  Konsistorial  Deputation  of 
Ladies  of  the  Lavatory  at  Loschwitz."  Perhaps,  here, 
too,  the  stirring  poem  entitled  "  To  Joy  "  was  composed, 
the  outcome  of  Schiller's  gladsome  heart,  a  lyric  which 
in  later  years  touched  Beethoven's  soul  with  its  fire. 
His  Leipzig  friends  had  no  knowledge  of  it  until  that 
November ;  probably  it  was  produced  in  that  month. 

At  the  beginning  of  October  Schiller  felt  somewhat 
depressed ;  he  yearned  for  one  absent  from  their  trio, 
for  Huber,  who  had  long  been  kept  from  those  who 
loved  him.  In  a  letter  to  him  of  October  5th,  Schiller 
writes :  "  The  boyhood  of  our  souls  is  now  ended,  as  I 
imagine  it ;  so,  too,  the  honeymoon  of  our  friendship. 
Let,  then,  our  hearts  cling  valiantly  each  to  each, 
dreaming  httle,  feehng  much,  planning  less,  and  work- 
ing all  the  more  faithfully."  And  this  was,  in  truth, 
the  mark  toward  which  Schiller  and  Korner  spurred 
each  other  onward.  The  latter,  with  his  wider  phil- 
osophical knowledge,  had  most  helpful  influence  upon 
the  poet.  After  reading  Watson's  "  Life  of  Philip  the 
Second,"  Schiller  saw  that  there  was  much  to  change 
in  his  own  conceptions  of  Philip  and  of  Alba.  The 
last  three  acts  of  "  Don  Carlos "  were  before  him, 
a  chaotic  mass,  that  disheartened  him,  and  from  which 
he  shrank.  How  feeble  he  seemed  when  set  against 
the  giant  Shakespeare  ! 


196  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

At  last,  in  the  middle  of  this  month,  he  moved  into 
the  lodgings  taken  for  Huber  and  himself  on  the  first 
floor  of  a  house  opposite  Korner's,  No.  16  Kohlenmarkt, 
now  No.  6.     Huber  also  came  thither  to  prepare  for 
his   diplomatic    career    under    Minister    Stutterheim. 
And  now  the  three  friends  worked  joyfully  in  concert. 
They    kept    out  of  the  common  circles  of  society  as 
much  as  possible.     Schiller  felt  himself  free,  and  grew 
glad  of  heart ;  he  saw  at  this  time  a  good  deal  of  his 
old   friend,  Sophie   Albrecht.     The  stage  had  gieater 
attraction  for  him  than  the  famous  art-collections.     At 
midday  and  evening  he  was  regularly  at  Korner's  house, 
w^here,  though  he  may  have  had  long  and  grave  phil- 
osophical discussions  with  its  owner,  the  family  was 
but  enlivened  by  his  pleasant  company.     He  was  also 
fond  of  a  game  at  whist.     Among  Korner's  acquaint- 
ances were  Professor  Wilhelm  Gottlieb  Becker,  Capell- 
meister  Naumanu,  Graft,  the  artist,  Keinhard,  the  court 
chaplain,    Archeuholz,   a    writer,    Neumann,    the    war 
secretary,  Wagner,  a  minister  of  finance,  and  others 
with  whom  Schiller  also  had  relation.     It  was  on  the 
29th   of    November   that   he  was  first  able    to    send 
Goeschen  some  MS.  for  the  second  number  of  Thalia, 
which  included  the  lyric  "  To  Joy,"  an  essay  by  Huber 
on  "  Modern  Greatness,"  and  the  Wiirtemberg  tale  of 
the   Sonnenwirth,  for  which  Abel  had  furnished   the 
details,  and  that  bore  unmistakable  marks  of  Diderot's 
influence.     Before  printing  the  second  act  of  the  "  Don 
Carlos,"    he    wished    to    submit  it   to  several    critics. 
When  the  first  four  sheets  of  proofs  came  to  hand,  to 
fill   up   space,  he  sent  a  couple  of  poems,  — "  Eesig- 
nation,  a  Phantasy,"  and  "  The  Free  Thought  of  Pas- 
sion,"  which  bore  this   addition,  "  When  Laura  was 
wedded,   in   the  year  1782."     Then    came   a   trifling 
auhadc  by  Sophie  Albrecht.     These  two  poems  of  his 
spoke  forth  such  vehement  antagonism  to  moral  law 
and  Christian  faith  that  the  writer  was  fearful  of  sharp 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  197 

censure  from  the  Leipzig  press  authorities.  Therefore 
he  begged  Goescheu,  for  the  sake  of  their  friendship 
and  for  the  honour  of  Tlialia  to  get  these  sheets 
printed  in  Dessau ;  Korner  had  also  suggested  this. 
There  were  most  weighty  reasons  for  his  wishing  to 
pubhsh  them ;  he  only  states  one,  however,  viz.,  that  in 
another  poem  he  means  to  confute  what  he  had  now 
written.  For  the  fire,  the  glow  that  he  had  breathed 
into  these  poems,  just  for  this  he  valued  them.  Goe- 
schen  submitted  them  to  the  Leipzig  censorship,  which 
received  them  more  leniently  than  Schiller  expected, 
asking  only  that  some  explanatory  note  be  appended 
for  the  benefit  of  the  intolerant.  Schiller  agreed  to 
this,  and  changed  the  titles  somewhat,  adding  prob- 
ably the  words,  "  When  Laura  was  wedded,  in  the  year 
1782,"  and  "A  Phantasy,"  which  were  originally  ab- 
sent. The  poems  are  both  signed  with  the  cipher  n, 
just  as  were  the  odes  to  Laura  in  the  "  Anthology." 
Immediately  afterward  he  sent  Goeschen  a  translation 
of  Mercier's  description  of  the  character  of  Philip  the 
Second,  and  finally  a  small  portion  of  the  second  act 
of  "  Don  Carlos,"  keeping  back  the  greater  half  for  the 
third  number.  And  the  third  number,  he  said,  could 
be  published  in  a  few  weeks  or  even  at  once,  as  he 
had  matter  enough,  so  he  believed,  for  a  whole  year. 
But  things  could  not  be  thus  hastened  on,  as  Schiller 
found,  to  his  annoyance.  He  was  most  desirous  to  see 
the  whole  of  the  second  act  of  his  play  in  the  public's 
hands,  yet  Goeschen  in  January  declared  that,  despite 
every  effort,  before  Easter  it  was  impossible  to  issue 
more  than  one  number.  Schiller  now  began  his  "  Phil- 
osophic Letters  "  between  Julius  and  Eaphael.  Kor- 
ner wrote  one  of  the  short  ones  by  Raphael.  It  was 
hard  work,  however,  to  get  him  to  compose  it,  and  for 
this  reason  there  was  much  joking  between  the  friends. 
The  correspondence  —  not  continued,  alas  !  —  sought 
to  show  that  assertions  such  as  were  here  made,  "  as- 


198  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

sertions  narrow,  exaggerated,  and  often  contradictory, 
find  at  last  their  solution,  are  fused  into  one  universal, 
clear,  and  firmly  founded  truth."  Eaphael,  to  turn  his 
younger  friend  from  fantastic  theories  as  to  God  and 
the  world,  points  out  to  him  the  worth  of  self-analysis, 
while  he  subjects  these  theories  to  strict  and  searching 
criticism,  showing  their  fallacy.  Julius,  in  Raphael's 
absence,  complains  that  liis  friend  has  spoiled  for  him 
his  fair  world  of  ideas  ;  but  the  latter  retorts  that  he 
has  but  hastened  on  a  crisis  which  Julius  needs  must 
reach,  and  that,  on  the  contrary,  he  has  proffered  him 
the  sublimest  pleasures  of  the  reason.  Most  of  the 
letters  of  Julius  take  us  back  to  Schiller's  youth ; 
already  in  the  days  of  the  "  Anthology  "  he  had  planned 
wT-iting  a  novel  in  the  form  of  letters  exchanged  by 
Julius  and  Eaphael ;  and  in  this  the  poem  "  Friend- 
ship "  was  to  have  place. 

When,  on  April  9th,  Korner  with  his  family  and  Huber 
went  to  Leipzig,  Schiller  stayed  behind  in  Dresden,  to 
work  with  all  diligence  at  his  drama.  But  unfor- 
tunately he  could  make  no  proper  progress.  The 
censors  of  the  press  had  taken  umbrage  at  one  passage 
in  it ;  this  threw  him  out  of  mood ;  a  far  graver  hin- 
drance was  his  unwonted  solitude,  which  robbed  him  of 
all  gaiety.  Then  his  position,  shifting,  uncertain  as  it 
was,  formed  a  source  of  trouble.  It  was  a  whole  year 
since  he  had  left  Mannheim,  and  had  been  living  upon 
Korner's  generosity,  yet  sure  though  his  purpose  and 
zealous  though  his  efforts,  there  lay,  so  far,  no  desirable 
prospect  in  view. 

He  heard  from  Charlotte  that,  by  her  husband's  wish, 
she  was  to  leave  Mannheim  and  go  to  Thiiringen  ; 
Beck  believed  she  would  probably  surprise  him  by  an 
unlooked  for  visit  at  Dresden.  Failing  to  rouse  his 
energies  for  any  kind  of  poetic  work,  he  spent  much 
time  in  reading ;  this  seemed  to  him  absolutely  neces- 
sary, for  he  had  still  an  amazing  deal  to  learn.     Besides 


THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  199 

Korner's  library,  he  could  use  that  of  the  Kurfiirst. 
He  accordingly  buried  himself  in  Abbt's  dissertation 
"  On  Merit ; "  he  felt  a  kind  of  kinship  with  its  author, 
who  had  died  young  some  twenty  years  back ;  hke 
him,  he  fancied  he  had  the  same  medley  in  his  mind  of 
fiery  thoughts  and  vague  speculations ;  only  that  while 
Abbt  came  nearer  to  being  a  clear-sighted  philosopher, 
he,  Schiller,  shared  more  the  sensuous  temperament  of 
the  poet.  His  love  for  history  now  grew  ever  deeper. 
A  translation  by  Eambach  of  Bougeant's  "  History  of  the 
Thirty  Years'  War "  greatly  stirred  him.  Writing  to 
Korner,  he  says  :  "  Strange  that  epochs  where  national 
woe  is  at  its  height  should  be  the  most  brilliant  epochs 
in  the  annals  of  human  power !  How  many  great  men 
stood  forth  from  this  gloom !  I  wish  that  for  ten 
years  running  I  had  only  read  history,  I  beheve  I 
should  be  quite  another  fellow  if  I  had.  Do  you  think 
I  shall  yet  be  able  to  retrieve  the  time  lost  ?  " 

Here  a  new  and  fruitful  field  for  work  seemed  open 
to  him,  where  was  needed  none  of  that  nerve-wasting 
strain  which  poetry  writing  caused.  In  the  continua- 
tion of  these  "  Philosophic  Letters "  the  question  for 
discussion  should  be  whether  a  political  or  an  ideal  sys- 
tem of  culture  were  the  more  excellent ;  no  subject, 
said  he,  gave  them  better  chance  to  blend  history  and 
philosophy  with  their  eloquence.  In  his  lonehness 
he  wrote  in  friendly  fashion  to  Reinwald,  his  future 
brother-in-law,  using  the  famihar  thou  in  his  letter, 
which  contained  an  enclosure  for  Frau  von  Wolzogen, 
whose  loan  he  had  never  yet  been  able  to  repay. 

At  length  the  Korners  came  back  from  Meiszen  on 
the  26th,  but  still  his  depression  did  not  end;  it 
specially  irked  him  that  Huber  wished  to  stop  in  Leip- 
zig during  May.  On  the  1st  of  that  month  he  com- 
plains to  him  of  moroseness  and  of  sheer  discontent ; 
that  his  heart  was  cramped,  deadened,  and  that  fancy's 
flame  had  gone  out  in  utter  darkness.     "  Strange  that 


200  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

each  awaking  and  each  downlying,  almost,  brings  me 
nearer  to  a  resolution,  to  the  resolve  to  go  one  step 
farther  ;  that  already  seems  to  me  half  taken.  I  need 
a  crisis.  Nature  prepares  for  destruction  that  she  may 
thereby  bring  forth  afresh.  It  may  well  be  that  you 
do  not  understand  me ;  but  I  understand  myself.  I 
could  weary  of  existence  if  it  were  worth  while  to  die." 
He  felt  an  impulse  toward  work  of  another  kind,  to  be 
achieved  when  holding  a  sure  and  honourable  posi- 
tion. Franzel,  a  musician  of  his  acquaintance,  had  come 
to  Dresden  for  a  week,  and  Schiller  says  he  is  going  to 
write  him  the  words  for  two  arias  and  a  terzett  in  his 
operetta.  He  means  to  compose  them  while  having  his 
hair  dressed,  just  to  learn  how  to  scribble.  But  scribble 
he  could  not.  At  this  time,  too,  in  compliance  with 
the  wishes  of  Korner  and  his  wife,  he  gave  sittings  to 
his  friend  Graff.  They  had  chosen  the  pose  in  which 
to  place  him ;  he  was  to  sit  as  they  had  watched  him 
sit  for  hours  when  alone  ;  thus  they  would  get  him 
to  remain  in  a  natural,  easy  position  —  not  his  usual 
one,  with  head  tossed  somewhat  defiantly  backwards. 
Schiller  sat  only  four  times  ;  the  hands  and  head  were 
at  once  finished,  the  rest  of  the  picture  being  merely 
sketched  in. 

On  the  afternoon  of  May  16th  Schwan  with  his  two 
daughters  reached  Dresden.  By  nine  the  next  morning 
he  had  not  yet  visited  Schiller,  who,  failing  to  see  him 
before  evening,  intended  to  caU  upon  him  at  liis  hotel. 
Though  offended  with  Schwan,  he  still  felt  gratitude 
toward  him,  as  being  the  first  who,  outside  Wurtem- 
berg,  had  told  him  of  his  abiUty,  and  who  had  taken 
a  more  than  trifling  interest  in  his  literary  progress. 
And  Schwan,  after  his  own  fashion,  felt  real  attach- 
ment to  the  poet,  though  he  was  hardly  sensible  how 
deep  such  attachment  was.  Wliether  he  called  on 
Schiller  first  is  not  known  to  us ;  it  is  certain,  though, 
that  they  met  as  good  friends,  and  Schiller  introduced 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  201 

his  publisher  to  the  Korners.  Since  her  father's 
refusal  he  was  far  from  wishing  to  revive  in  Margareta 
any  of  the  old  tenderness  she  might  once  have  cherished. 
He  is  said  to  have  walked  with  the  two  sisters  on  the 
Briihler  Terrace,  while  their  father  sat  with  Graff  the 
painter.  Schwau  afterward  wrote  from  Leipzig  his 
thanks  to  the  "  dearest  friend  "  who  had  made  their 
short  stay  in  Dresden  one  "  ever  to  be  remembered," 
nor  would  they  forget  the  cordial  welcome  given  to 
them  by  Schiller's  friends  there. 

Schwan  had  told  the  poet  how  highly  Wieland  es- 
teemed his  talent,  to  whom  the  poet  sent  a  letter,  as 
Schwan  was  travelling  back  by  way  of  Weimar.  This 
spoke  of  his  unsettled  position ;  it  deplored  his  present 
state  of  enforced  independence,  which  otherwise  he 
held  to  be  of  all  lots  the  most  enviable.  He  wished 
for  Wieland's  judgment  upon  the  Thalia  when  more 
of  its  matter  should  be  complete  for  publication. 
Schiller  was  thinking  of  Weimar,  of  forming  a  connec- 
tion there.  He  writes  to  Goeschen  on  June  1st,  to  send 
him  without  delay  a  nice  copy  of  the  first  number  of 
the  Thalia  which  he  wished  to  present  to  "  His 
Grace  of  Weimar." 

He  made  no  advance  with  the  journal,  however, 
while  his  "  Carlos  "  was  put  aside  for  another  dramatic 
poem  in  prose,  "  The  Manhater  Appeased,"  a  first  out- 
line of  which  he  had  already  planned  when  in  Mann- 
heim. Then,  too,  he  was  dreaming  of  a  romance,  "  The 
Ghostseer,"  where  his  original  scheme  for  "  Friedrich 
Imhof  "  was  to  be  developed  in  quite  another  fashion. 

By  way  of  merrily  celebrating  Korner's  birthday,  the 
2d  of  July,  Schiller,  with  the  help  of  Dora's  paint-box, 
prepared  a  series  of  thirteen  grotesque  caricatures,  set- 
ting forth  Korner's  good-humoured  weaknesses.  Huber 
supphed  droll  explanations  for  these,  which  bore  the 
title,  "  Adventures  of  the  New  Telemachus ;  or.  The 
Life  and  Labours  of  Kbrner  the  Decent,  the  Consequen- 


202  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

tial,  the  Piquant,  etc.,  set  forth  in  fine  ilhiminated 
plates  by  Mr.  Hogarth,  with  appropriate  explanations 
by  Wiuckelmaun.  .  .  .  liome,  1786." 

Minna's  expected  lying-in  was  now  a  cause  of  grave 
anxiety  to  all.  On  the  24th  of  this  month  she  gave 
birth  to  a  son,  but  her  continued  illness  threw  a  gloom 
over  the  whole  circle.  Schiller  was  too  distressed  to 
answer  his  father's  letter,  which  told  him  of  Christo- 
phine's  marriage,  but  which,  it  is  true,  contained  allu- 
sion to  Margareta  and  to  studying  medicine.  Even 
the  kind  inquiries  of  Charlotte  von  Wolzogen,  once  so 
dear  to  him,  gained  not  a  word  of  acknowledgment. 

Once  more  he  sought  to  succeed  in  drama,  and  ac- 
cordingly began  to  prepare  his  "  Don  Carlos  "  for  the 
stage.  He  had  heard  through  Beck  of  the  interest 
taken  by  Schroder  in  the  fragments  hitherto  pub- 
lished of  the  play ;  and  this  strengthened  his  resolve. 
Schroder  was  at  that  time  the  director  of  the  Ham- 
burg Theatre;  on  September  12th  Schiller  applies  to 
him  by  letter,  saying  that  the  zeal  for  drama-writing, 
half  lost  to  him  when  in  Mannheim,  had  now  revived, 
yet  that  he  dreaded  the  awful  maltreatment  which 
plays  received  at  the  German  theatres.  "  By  this  time 
I  have  thoroughly  got  to  learn  the  bounds  imposed 
upon  the  poet  by  stage  scenery,  and  by  all  the  other 
requisites  of  a  theatre ;  there  are  other  and  closer 
limits,  however,  fixed  by  the  small-mindedness  of  the 
incompetent  artist;  and  these  the  genius  of  a  great 
actor  and  thinker  overleaps.  But  I  would  wish  to  be 
free  from  such  Hmits ;  thus  I  the  readier  hail  the 
thought  of  realising  by  my  closer  relation  to  you  an 
ideal  which  without  you  I  should  have  hopelessly  to 
abandon."  Schroder  was  to  have  all  his  plays,  who,  by 
revising  them,  would  make  him  write  with  greater 
enthusiasm.  By  the  end  of  the  year  he  hoped  to  have 
recast  his  "  Carlos  "  in  dramatic  form.  Next  January, 
too,  "The   Manhater"   would   be   finished;    the   chief 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  203 

character  in  it  could  only  be  acted  by  one  who  had 
already  created  for  Germany  the  parts  of  Lear  and 
Hamlet.  While  waiting  in  eagerness  for  Schroder's 
answer,  he  finished  the  opening  portion  of  "  The  Ghost- 
seer"  (to  be  inserted  in  the  fourth  number  of  Thalia), 
and  worked  on  at  "  Don  Carlos."  He  also  announced 
the  issue  of  a  work  to  which  various  authors  would 
contribute,  "  A  History  of  Eemarkable  Conspiracies  and 
Eebellions,  from  the  Middle  Ages  down  to  the  Present 
Day."  For  this  he  hoped  to  furnish  his  "  Fall  of  the 
Netherlands." 

The  accession  of  a  new  king  to  the  throne  of  Prussia 
brought  our  poet  no  hope,  for  those  in  authority  at 
Berhn  showed  him  httle  favour.  On  the  other  hand, 
he  advised  Frau  von  Wolzogeu,  who  was  in  distress  as 
to  her  two  youngest  sons,  to  apply  to  his  Majesty,  then 
in  a  bountiful  mood ;  he  offered  even  to  write  a  letter 
on  her  behalf  that  the  king  should  never  callously 
reject.  He  tells  her,  besides,  that  she  shall  certainly 
receive  money  from  him  at  Easter. 

By  the  18th  of  October  Schroder  had  already  asked 
him  upon  what  conditions  he  would  come  to  Ham- 
burg as  playwright.  There  was  no  need  at  his  theatre 
to  fear  such  treatment  as  he  had  received  in  Mann- 
heim ;  in  any  case  Schroder  wished  the  plays  to  be 
sent  to  him.  But  Schiller  hesitated,  wavered ;  he 
would  not  bind  himself.  Parting  with  Korner  was  a 
bitter  thought ;  and  he  was  daily  expecting  Charlotte's 
answer,  who,  staying  then  for  her  health's  sake  with 
relations  at  Gotha,  designed  to  draw  him  to  herself. 
Moreover,  it  was  not  possible  to  appear  at  Hamburg 
before  "  Don  Carlos  "  was  completed.  Thus  he  delayed 
giving  reply  for  nearly  two  whole  months.  And  it 
was  fortunate  for  him  that  he  did  so,  that  he  did  not 
a  second  time  turn  playwright,  but  tliat  he  left  work  in 
this  field  until  his  powers  had  grown  riper. 

He  arranged  with  Goeschen  for  the  publication  of 


204  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

"  Don  Carlos,"  which  was  to  appear  at  Easter.  He 
was  paid  at  the  rate  of  ten  thalers  the  sheet.  The  sale 
of  Thalia  was  such  a  bad  one,  that  the  publisher 
wished  to  issue  the  numbers  in  volume  form  under 
another  title.  Schiller  was  nettled  by  what  he  termed 
a  stupid  critique  in  the  Neue  Bihliothek  der  Schonen 
Wissenschaftcn  of  his  "  Carlos ; "  its  blunt  vehemence 
showed  it  to  have  been  written  with  a  motive ;  the 
form  in  which  the  complete  play  would  appear,  should 
be  his  only  answer.  Director  Dobbelin  had  just  ac- 
cepted the  piece  for  the  Berlin  National  Theatre. 

It  was  a  sad  December  for  Korner  and  his  house- 
hold. The  infant  died  on  the  10th,  while  Minna's 
health  still  caused  them  anxiety.  Her  husband  went 
to  Leipzig  during  the  middle  of  the  month  to  consult 
a  physician  there,  and  Schiller  with  Huber  took  up  his 
quarters  at  Korner's  house.  He  now  gave  answer  to 
Schroder ;  it  was  impossible  to  come,  he  said,  for  he 
was  living  in  the  bosom  of  a  family  that  had  need  of 
him.  Circumstances  made  it  necessary  for  him  to  stay 
in  Dresden,  and  he  must  first  arrange  matters  formally 
with  the  Duke  of  Weimar,  as  it  was  a  regular  engage- 
ment which  took  him  to  Hamburg.  He  was  still  ever 
hoping  for  some  sort  of  intercession  on  the  duke's  part, 
little  though  the  gift  of  just  a  councillor's  title  helped 
to  strengthen  such  hope.  Next  year  perhaps  he  would 
come.  As  to  the  "  Carlos,"  which  would  be  ready  in 
six  weeks'  time,  he  asks  whether  he  ought  to  rewrite 
it  in  prose,  and  if  the  play  may  last  three  hours.  In 
Korner's  absence  he  grew  depressed,  sufiering  at  times 
from  deep  melancholy ;  his  letters  contained  self-re- 
proaches that  he  was  of  such  little  use  to  his  friends, 
that  he  had  not  yet  been  able  to  requite  their  kindness. 
He  was  working  at  "  Carlos,"  as  he  must  keep  his 
promise  to  Goeschen,  yet  he  was  not  in  the  vein  for 
writing.  He  felt  how  in  the  most  mo\dng  scenes  he 
lacked  fire ;  here  and  there,  only,  under  the  ashes,  one 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  205 

might  detect  a  spark.  Korner  urgently  besought  liini 
not  to  finish  the  play  in  a  hurry ;  it  would  be  far 
better  to  postpone  its  issue.  Schiller  was  also  uneasy 
at  Charlotte's  silence,  who  from  Weimar  had  gone  to 
Kalbsried,  although  it  pleased  him  to  feel  that  he  had 
not  to  leave  his  friends  for  some  time  to  come.  When, 
after  three  weeks,  Korner  at  length  returned,  their 
circle  won  back  its  old  gaiety,  for  Minna  was  now  on 
the  road  to  health.  There  were  the  same  philosophical 
discussions,  the  same  serious  ponderings  with  Korner 
upon  life.  Schiller  gladly  hailed  Eeineke's  offer  of  a 
hundred  thalers  for  a  prose  version  of  the  "  Don  Car- 
los "  which  was  needed  for  the  Dresden  theatre.  But 
Dobbelin,  on  the  other  hand,  now  that  Engel  and 
Ramler  had  the  joint  management  of  the  Berlin  play- 
house, was  obliged,  in  their  name,  to  retract  his  former 
promise  to  accept  the  piece.  Engel  found  that  Schiller's 
dramas  conformed  too  little  to  usual  rules.  The  prose 
version  was  quickly  thrown  off,  and  the  closing  scene 
completed;  yet  with  the  edition  for  press  but  slow 
progress  was  made.  And  into  the  poet's  life  of  work 
and  enjoyment  now  suddenly  came  another  influence, 
the  influence  of  love,  which  lit,  which  wholly  wrapped 
his  heart  and  soul  in  its  resistless  flame. 


CHAPTEPt  III. 

FROM    FEBRUARY    TO    JULY,    1787. 

At  a  masked  ball  to  which  he  went  with  the  Korners 
and  Huber,  Schiller  was  accosted  by  a  pretty  fortune- 
telling  gipsy  maid.  She  thoroughly  captivated  him, 
and  after  Minna,  wearied  by  the  crowd,  had  gone  home 
with  her  husband,  he  stayed  behind  with  Huber  for  a 
long  while.  The  fair  fortune-teller  proved  to  be  EHza- 
beth  Henrietta  von  Arnim,  a  lovely  damsel  of  nineteen, 
the  second  of  three  sisters.  Their  mother,  an  officer's 
widow,  was  attached  to  the  court.  Schiller  was 
irresistibly  fascinated  by  Mile,  von  Arnim's  beauty 
of  face  and  archness  of  manner.  He  often  met  her 
after  this  at  Sophie  Albrecht's  house,  and  in  time  he 
obtained  an  introduction  to  her  family.  The  mother 
was  not  averse  to  see  the  famous  poet  among  her  daugh- 
ter's adorers,  among  whom  were  a  Count  Waldstein- 
Dux  and  a  rich  Jewish  banker.  On  many  an  evening 
now  Schiller's  place  at  the  tea-table  was  vacant ;  Minna 
quickly  guessed  what  the  magnet  was  that  attracted 
him ;  and  he  did  not  deny  that  by  winning  Jettchen 
he  looked  to  reach  the  zenith  of  his  earthly  happiness. 
He  gave  her  his  portrait,  and  received  one  of  hers  in 
return;  he  could  not  enough  admire  its  heavenly 
beauty.  Vain  were  all  the  warnings  of  Korner,  Minna, 
or  Dora ;  his  whole  heart  was  filled  by  the  maiden's 
unequalled  loveliness  of  person  and  of  character. 

Early  in  March  the  second  act  of  his  play  had  gone 
to  the  printer ;  the  remaining  one,  though  for  the  most 

206 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  207 

part  ready,  needed  still  thorough  revision,  and  the  clos- 
ing metres  would  have  to  be  amended.  Wieland  had 
spoken  admiringly  of  Schiller's  genius  in  liis  Mcrcur, 
when  reviewing  the  three  last  numbers  of  Tluilia  ;  and 
though  he  found  less  evidence  in  the  "  Carlos "  than 
elsewhere  of  the  writer's  poetic  force,  Schiller  hoped 
that  the  play  when  entirely  revised  would  gain  Wie- 
land's  unstinted  praise.  He  was  also  planning  out  his 
exciting  novel,  "  The  Ghostseer,"  and  had  begun  upon 
the  "  History  of  the  Revolt  of  the  Netherlands." 

Koch,  the  director  of  the  Eiga  Theatre,  visited  him 
in  Leipzig,  and  wished  for  the  prose  version  of  the 
forthcoming  play.  Groszmann  of  Frankfort  also  asked 
for  it,  but  upon  moderate  terms,  as  he  had  suffered 
heavy  loss  by  fire.  "  You  shall  have  it,"  wrote  Schiller, 
who  just  then  wanted  money.  "  The  terms  shall  be 
those  asked  by  one  hurnt-oiU  man  of  another,  never 
built  up  at  all.  Twelve  ducats  is  a  sum  that,  for  you 
and  for  me,  I  hold  to  be  cheap."  Love  in  all  its  joy 
and  teen  had  overwhelmed  him ;  to  see  his  fair,  to 
gladden  her  by  speech  or  gifts,  was  his  one  desire.  On 
some  evenings  he  was  often  hindered  from  entering 
her  house,  and  though  they  told  him  that  this  was 
done  with  Jettchen's  consent,  it  only  fanned  the  flame. 
When  the  Arnims  left  Dresden  for  a  time,  at  Easter, 
he  stayed  behind ;  all  the  many  memories  of  his  be- 
loved filled  him  with  unrest ;  all  poetic  energy,  all 
interest  in  life,  flagged.  Then  Korner  and  his  wife 
determined  to  bring  him  away  from  Dresden ;  they 
took  him  on  April  17th  to  Tharand,  a  pretty  little  town 
some  two  miles  distant.  By  such  rest  his  heart  might 
here  win  back  its  mirth,  and  his  mind,  its  bent  for 
poetry.  But  life  at  an  inn  was  all  too  prosaic  for  him ; 
it  seemed  like  exile  on  some  barren  island.  Unfor- 
tunately, rain  fell  for  several  days  together,  so  that  he 
could  not  leave  the  house.  "  I  have  been  working, 
though,"  he  says  on  the  20th.     "  How  ?     No  matter 


2o8  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

about  that."  He  wrote  a  letter  to  Jettchen,  which 
Dora  was  to  deliver  at  her  house  and  receive  its  answer. 
But  if  she  had  not  come  home  from  her  journey  it 
must  be  brought  back.  On  the  21st  he  gets  three 
delightful  letters.  The  first  from  Jettchen,  who  had 
fixed  her  home  arrival  for  that  evening.  The  second 
was  from  Charlotte,  saying  that  she  intended  to  spend 
the  summer  in  Weimar,  where  she  longed  for  his  pres- 
ence, and  that  she  had  given  a  landscape-painter  intro- 
ductions to  him.  The  third  letter  was  from  Dalberg, 
who  agreed  to  accept  the  "  Carlos  "  for  the  sum  of  one 
hundred  thalers.  He  wished  for  it  in  its  verse  form, 
in  iambics,  as  he  had  already  had  some  success  with  a 
piece  written  in  like  metre.  On  the  22d,  the  first  day 
of  tolerable  weather,  Schiller  roamed  over  the  hills,  for 
he  had  absolute  need  of  exercise.  He  fitted  together 
the  fragments  of  his  "  Carlos "  and  recast  the  prose 
scenes ;  one  fine  week  of  spring  should  now  see  all 
completed,  so  he  thought.  Of  course  such  tremendous 
haste  had  obliged  him  to  reject  many  a  happy  idea, 
many  a  suggestion  made  by  the  higher  part  of  him  ; 
but  that  was  good,  he  said,  for  his  piece  was  already 
overcharged,  and  these  germs  of  thought  should  "  bring 
forth  splendid  fruit  in  a  time  of  ripe  perfection."  Dur- 
ing the  same  day  Jettchen's  little  brother  came  to 
Tharand.  On  Sunday,  the  23d,  he  sent  the  re-revised 
prose  version  of  "  Don  Carlos  "  to  Kbrner,  who  was  to 
get  three  acting  copies  made  of  it.  He  promised  to 
forward  next  day  the  continuation  for  press.  That 
afternoon  he  had  a  visit  from  Jettchen  and  her  mother  ; 
unfortunately  Count  Waldstein  also  arrived  at  Tharand, 
and  this  exasperated  Schiller  no  less  than  Jettchen, 
especially  as  he  saw  how  her  mother  encouraged  the 
nobleman's  suit.  Koruer  felt  annoyed  that  by  this 
the  "  Carlos "  was  once  more  likely  to  be  neglected ; 
but  Schiller  consoled  him  by  saying  that  there  w^ere 
thirteen  sheets  at  the  printer's,  and  that  he  was  not 


■     THE  LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  209 

pressed  for  time ;  he  had  thoughts  of  writing  an  addi- 
tional scene ;  perhaps  of  completing  the  third  act  also. 
But  his  passion  disquieted  him  and  kept  him  from  this. 
He  lost  no  time  in  writing  to  Jettchen,  telhng  her  of 
his  early  love  episodes,  informing  her,  too,  of  his  inti- 
macy with  Charlotte.  Jettchen's  answer  of  the  28th 
ran  thus : 

"  I  had  firmly  resolved  never  to  love  again,"  she 
confesses ;  "  never  to  believe  myself  loved ;  I  meant 
to  be  as  fickle  as  are  most  men,  and  to  guard  against 
all  that  could  awaken  sentiment;  still,  I  wished  to 
keep  a  troop  of  adorers  about  me,  listening  to  each, 
and  putting  faith  in  none.  But  here  I  erred,  for 
I  judged  all  men  by  the  standard  of  one  whom  I  had 
judged  all  too  well ;  I  did  not  think  that  there  were 
exceptions.  Hardly  had  I  spoken  twice  with  you, 
when  I  speedily  discovered  that,  in  counting  to  keep 
all  love  away  from  my  heart,  I  had  erred.  True,  I  con- 
fess, that  before  this  I  had  already  felt  affection,  but  in 
a  far  less  degree  than  now,  for  my  first  passion  was 
prompted  by  vanity ;  I  was  surprised,  without  the 
power  of  analysing  my  real  feelings."  She  only  ven- 
tured, she  said,  to  confess  all  this  to  him,  from  which 
he  could  judge  how  deeply  she  loved  him.  That  which 
SchiUer  told  her  of  his  intimacy  with  his  friend  Char- 
lotte had  made  her  most  curious  ;  it  would  hardly  seem 
to  be  altogether  a  proper  friendship,  since  he  was  so 
terribly  mysterious  about  it.  She  therefore  asked  if  he 
would  or  could  be  more  explicit.  Every  letter  of  his, 
even  the  smallest,  she  had  preserved ;  hers,  again,  were 
not  worth  the  reading  —  full  of  huge  blunders,  and  with 
all  the  fine,  high-flown  passages  manifestly  clipped  from 
some  old  romance.  Just  these  remarks  of  Jettchen 
must  have  confirmed  the  opinion  of  Schiller's  friends 
about  her,  and  must  have  served  to  cool  his  ardour ; 
here  she  frankly  confesses  to  have  loved  some  one  else 
through  vanity,  and  to  have  coquetted  with  many  more, 


2IO  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

even  though  she  now  wished  Schiller  to  effect  her  con- 
version. Perhaps  in  this  letter  he  saw  her  mother's 
influencing  hand.  He  was  still  too  troubled  in  mind 
for  any  work  at  his  play;  the  pain  at  tinding  that 
Jettchen  was  not  she  for  whom  his  heart  craved,  tor- 
tured him.  And  though  he  might  throw  all  blame 
upon  her  mother,  and  try  to  respect  Jettclien's  warm- 
hearted, noble  sentiment,  there  could  be  no  longer 
thought  of  heart-unity  between  them,  and  she  could 
never  yield  him  that  rest  of  soul  for  which  he 
yearned. 

The  actual  ending  —  we  might  almost  say  the 
breaking  off  of  this  love  episode  —  was  made  by  some 
charming  verses  which  Schiller  sent  to  Jettchen  on 
May  2d.  He  here  speaks  but  of  "  sympathy  of  hearts," 
of  "  friendship,"  "  whose  rare  and  lovely  lot "  she  shared. 
The  lines  closed  thus : 

"  For  me,  too,  be  there  kept  this  name  so  splendid, 
Oh,  guard  a  place  for  me  within  thy  heart ! 
Fate  made  us  meet  when  youth  was  almost  ended, 
And  yet  our  bond  the  ages  shall  not  part. 

"  True  friendship,  this  is  all  that  I  can  bring  thee ; 
And  what  1  earn  will  be  my  heart  alone ; 
For  ever  will  I  strive  how  I  may  win  thee ; 

Thy  heart  T  hold,  didst  thou  "but  know  mine  own." 

We  have  no  knowledge  whether  a  letter  went  with 
these  lines,  but  from  them  alone  Jettchen  must  have 
seen  that  he  was  changed  ;  and  if  she  failed  to  do  this, 
her  mother  would  have  brought  it  to  her  notice.  Ma- 
dame von  Arnim  counselled  her  daughter  for  the  first 
to  make  no  reply  ;  it  was  the  only  way,  she  said,  to 
win  back  the  poet.  Schiller,  after  two  days  of  vain 
expectancy,  then  vented  his  rancour  in  a  letter,  taxing 
Jettchen  with  indifference,  and  in  which  he  stated  his 
resolve  to  stay  another  week  at  Tharand  by  way  of 
revenge. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  211 

"  Does  it  flatter  you  to  feel  that  you  have  roused 
sentimeuts  which  you  cannot  return  ? "  he  writes. 
Further,  he  insinuates  that  by  her  feigned  affection  she 
probably  had  only  wished  to  yoke  him  to  her  car 
of  triumph.  To  this,  next  day,  there  came  back  a  curt 
rejoinder,  in  which  we  seem  to  hear  the  mother's  voice 
rather  than  the  daughter's.  His  letter  showed,  it 
is  said,  that  pride  had  far  stronger  sway  over  him 
than  love. 

"  You  know  this  but  too  well,  that  you  first  awoke 
love  within  me,  and  perhaps  out  of  courtesy  you  pre- 
tended to  feel  something  also  ;  but  now  it  wearies  you 
to  waste  your  time  over  so  wretched  a  mortal  (as  in 
your  eyes  I  must  be),  so  by  degrees  you  beat  a  retreat, 
though  gallant  enough  to  inform  me,  by  way  of  sparing 
my  vanity,  that  I  am  to  blame  for  your  indifference. 
.  .  .  But  must  I  then  be  nothing  short  of  a  sublime 
creature  in  order  to  gain  your  love  ?  Is  what  I  count 
in  of  no  merit  in  your  sight,  namely,  to  love  you  above 
all  things  ?  To  do  that,  you  think,  is  easy  enough,  but 
to  win  your  affection,  that  means,  of  course,  a  great 
deal  more."  She  ends  with  the  news  that  her  mother 
intends  to  \isit  him  to-morrow,  Sunday,  at  Tharand,  if 
he  were  not  expecting  other  and  better  company  — 
some  more  intellectual  friends  —  with  whom  such 
homely  every-day  folk  as  they  would  form  but  a  sorry 
contrast.  Schiller  could  only  see  the  clearer  from  all 
this  that  with  such  a  mother-in-law  he  could  never 
expect  to  spend  a  quiet  life  with  Jettchen ;  thus  he 
the  readier  gave  up  all  claim  to  her  hand,  though  his 
own  future  was  still  blank  and  hopeless.  Love's  fire 
cooled  down  to  the  even  temperature  of  friendship. 

Before  the  middle  of  May  he  at  last  returned  to 
Dresden,  where  he  earnestly  worked  at  the  final  por- 
tion of  "  Don  Carlos."  As  Goeschen  had  promised  to 
bring  out  the  piece  at  Eastertide,  which  was  now  over, 
he  only  let  the  first  section  of  the  play  appear,  with 


2  12  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  note  that  the  second  part,  together  with  plate  and 
title-page,  should  follow  in  a  fortnight. 

Schiller  now  firmly  resolved  to  visit  Charlotte  as 
soon  as  possible  in  Weimar,  who  was  longing  to  see 
him  again,  for  it  was  her  deepest  desire  to  live  where 
he  lived.  He  thought,  too,  to  revive  his  friendly  rela- 
tions with  the  Duke  of  Weimar,  and  to  become  con- 
nected with  some  of  the  leading  men  of  Ilmathen.  He 
does  not  regret  that  Goethe  was  away,  travelling  in 
Italy,  for  he  had  httle  wish  to  put  himself  forward  in 
Weimar  at  the  side  of  so  great  a  man.  When  "  Carlos  " 
should  be  completed,  he  believed  he  might  contentedly 
let  it  stand  upon  its  own  merit. 

The  prose  version  of  this  for  the  stage  had  been 
submitted ;  but  that  in  iambics  must  also  be  prepared. 
When  he  finally  sent  this  last  to  Schroder  on  the  23d 
of  June,  he  said  that  many  matters,  and  one  hindrance 
stronger  than  all,  in  that  it  was  an  affaire  du  cmur,  had 
kept  him  from  finishing  sooner  the  version  promised 
for  January.  With  the  other  acting  editions  (now  for 
the  most  part  sent  out)  he  had  made  all  possible  haste  ; 
Schroder,  however,  must  be  furnished  with  riper  and 
more  thoughtful  work.  "  All  !  that  I  might  now  reap 
the  fruits  of  my  toil,  that  I  might  revel  in  the  sight  of 
my  '  Carlos '  put  upon  your  stage.  ...  I  shall  see 
you,  and  my  sense  for  drama,  well-nigh  extinct,  will 
wake  anew  within  me.  To  you  I  look  for  this  recon- 
ciliation of  my  muse  with  the  stage,  which  most  of 
the  theatres  that  hitherto  I  have  seen  have  dis- 
couraged rather  than  helped.  Perhaps  by  the  end  of 
the  summer  you'll  have  me  at  Hamburg.  In  two  or 
three  weeks  I  shall  set  out  on  a  journey  that  is  to  end 
with  Hamburg.  I  am  going  to  bring  you  a  new  piece 
('  The  Manhater ').  Now,  to  descend  to  prose.  If,  be- 
fore I  start,  you  could  send  me  some  money,  it  would 
be  very  welcome.  I  need  it  to  travel  with,  and  I  think 
it  would  be  ridiculous  on  my  part  to  make  a  secret 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  213 

to  you  of  such  a  thing.  I  have  thoughts  of  leaving 
Dresden  at  the  end  of  this  month."  He  informed 
Charlotte  of  his  intention  to  go  to  Weimar,  in  a  letter 
wherein  he  opened  out  his  heart  to  her,  making  spe- 
cial confession  of  the  now  vanished  passion  for  the 
bewitching  Mile.  Arnim.  This  letter,  Charlotte  tells 
us,  having  reached  her  at  midnight,  she  kept  unread 
till  the  next  day.  But  when  morning  came  she  could 
not  find  it,  and  this  seemed  so  strange  to  her  that  she 
believed  it  all  to  be  a  dream,  and  lived  through  many 
melancholy  days  while  waiting  for  the  poet's  answer. 
He,  again,  was  surprised  at  her  silence. 

Schiller  found  it  impossible  to  leave  his  friend  before 
the  2d  of  July,  Korner's  birthday,  that  two  years  since 
had  been  to  both  such  a  notable  feast.  The  Httle  farce 
he  now  wrote,  called  "  Korner's  Forenoon,"  shows  how 
strangely  merry  he  then  was.  Many  a  comic  situa- 
tion, many  a  droll  event,  was  here  pictured  with  great 
skUl ;  how,  for  instance,  Korner  loses  a  whole  morning 
through  numberless  petty  interruptions,  so  that  he  is 
finally  driven  to  send  an  apology  to  the  Consistorium 
for  his  absence.  All  the  free,  unconventional  style  of 
living  in  the  Korner  household  is  here  humourously 
immortahsed.  The  poet  himself  had  four  different 
r61es  to  play  besides  his  own  ;  the  costume  for  this  last 
was  to  include  "  summer  overcoat,  yellow  slippers,  and 
a  snuff-box." 

By  the  4th  Schiller  was  able  to  thank  Schroder  for 
twenty-one  louis  d'or  in  payment  for  "  Don  Carlos,"  and 
for  a  translation  by  Huber  of  a  short  French  comedy. 
The  letter  of  acknowledgment  said  that  now  he  could 
start  for  Weimar  unhindered,  and  after  a  few  weeks 
spent  there  he  should  come  on  to  Hamburg.  Still  he 
wavered.  He  could  not  bring  himself  to  leave  his 
friends  even  for  a  short  time ;  a  dread  came  over  him 
that  he  was  standing  at  a  turning-point  in  his  hf e  — 
that  he  was  taking  a  step  whose  importance  lay  far 


2  14  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

ahead  in  the  gloom  of  the  future.  Eesolved  at  last,  he 
at  once  wrote  to  Charlotte,  for  whose  answer  to  a 
former  letter  he  had  vamly  looked.  He  then  discussed 
the  question  of  his  departure  at  great  length  with 
Komer  and  Huber.  He  procured  himself  a  court  dress, 
which,  however,  he  never  used,  as  his  plain  evening 
clothes  were  enough  for  the  visit  he  had  to  make. 
Korner  jestingly  proposed  to  him  the  daughter  of  Privy 
Councillor  Schmidt  as  a  rich  heiress  to  espouse.  He 
parted  with  the  Arnims  on  friendly  terms  —  some  of 
tlie  old  affection  for  Jettchen  lingered  still  in  his  heart. 
He  undertook  a  message  for  her  younger  sister,  who 
was  then  in  a  convent  at  Erfurt.  Notwithstanding 
Korner's  help,  at  whose  table  he  was  treated  as  a 
guest,  in  spite  of  the  sums  gained  by  "  Don  Carlos " 
and  the  journal  Tlialia,  his  love  episode  had  made 
him  extravagant  in  the  matter  of  gifts,  and  he  had 
fallen  into  debt.  Korner,  after  knowing  the  amount 
he  owed,  helped  him  to  pay  off'  the  most  urgent  debts 
by  standing  surety  for  his  friend,  who  could  thus 
borrow  the  loan  of  three  hundred  and  ten  thalers  from 
one  Beit,  a  Jew.  On  the  19th  they  spent  their  last 
evening  together  at  Loschwitz,  walking  to  a  little  cop- 
pice wliich  crowned  a  hill  close  by,  where  the  time 
passed  mirthfully  amid  clink  of  glasses  and  song. 
Next  day  the  poet  had  Dresden  behind  him ;  he 
travelled  to  Leipzig  with  an  old  acquaintance,  the  wife 
of  Schneider,  the  publisher. 

The  chief  intellectual  result  of  Schiller's  stay  at 
Dresden  had  been  before  all  things  the  "  Don  Carlos," 
which  was  in  many  ways  a  great  advance  upon  his 
other  dramas,  although  the  poet  had  not  wholly  kept 
his  immense  power  in  check.  Perhaps  through  the 
lengthy  process  of  transformation  and  rearrangement 
the  play  may  have  lost  something  of  poetic  unity. 
Beside  that  and  "  The  Manhater,"  he  had  been  plan- 
ning another  drama,  "  Juhan  the  Apostate."      In  this 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  215 

last  the  beauty  of  Greek  mythology  was  to  be  set 
in  sharp  contrast  to  the  stern  asceticism  of  Chris- 
tianity. He  had  promised  to  issue  six  numbers 
annually  of  the  Thalia,  yet  during  these  two  years 
spent  at  Leipzig  and  Dresden,  in  spite  of  help  from 
Huber,  Eeinwald,  and  others,  three  only  had  appeared. 
But  he  had  begun  upon  another  work,  "  The  Ghost- 
seer,"  which  was  hereafter  to  prove  of  high  importance 
to  him ;  he  had  turned  to  history  as  well,  and  was 
preparing  a  description  of  the  revolt  in  the  Nether- 
lands. Korner's  society  and  influence  had,  moreover, 
led  him  to  take  interest  in  philosophy.  Here,  sharing 
the  pleasures  of  this  cheerful  family  circle  (the  first  he 
had  ever  known  of  domestic  enjoyment,  for  he  had 
met  nothing  like  it  in  his  own  dismal  home),  his 
sympathies  were  one  and  all  quickened.  Korner's 
noble,  manly  friendship  had  raised  him,  and  the  first 
rays  of  real  affection  had  touched  his  soul  and  left 
upon  it  their  abiding  trace. 


Book   VII. 
Fresh   Fields  of  Action 


CHAPTER  I. 

FROM  JULY,  1787,  TO  JANUARY,  1788. 

On  reachiug  Naumburg,  Schiller  found  that  the 
Duke  of  Weimar  had  just  passed  through  the  town 
on  his  way  to  Potsdam.  He  was  sorry  to  have  missed 
seeing  him,  although  his  Grace,  then  absorbed  in  poli- 
tics, would  scarcely  have  taken  closer  interest  in  the 
poet.  Arriving  at  Weimar  that  evening,  Schiller  put 
up  at  the  hotel  in  the  market-place,  Zum  Erbprinzen, 
and  instantly  went  to  see  Charlotte.  "  Our  first  meet- 
ing," he  writes  to  Korner,  two  days  later,  "  was  so 
hurried,  so  bewildering,  that  I  am  at  a  loss  to  describe 
it  to  you.  Charlotte  has  remained  all  that  she  always 
was,  even  with  some  slight  marks  of  ill-health,  which, 
hidden  from  me  by  the  excitement  of  our  meeting,  I 
had  not  noticed  until  to-day."  A  fortnight  afterward, 
he  tells  his  friend  the  whole  truth. 

"  She  had  been  expecting  me  with  keen  anxiety  and 
impatience.  My  last  letter,  assuring  her  of  my  coming, 
caused  her  such  uneasiness  that  her  health  suffered 
thereby.  She  had  clung  but  to  this  thought,  and, 
having  me,  her  capacity  for  gladness  was  gone.  Such 
lengthy  waiting  had  exhausted  her ;  joy  was  benumb- 
ing in  its  effect."  This  was  his  explanation  of  the 
chilly  welcome  given  to  him  by  his  old  friend,  as 
morbid,  as  unhealthy  in  mind  as  ever,  and  only  more 
sickly,  more  full  of  repining  than  before.  He  too 
was  changed,  and  looked  for  consolation  where  he  had 
to  console.  Strange,  the  confession  he  makes  on  the 
23d. 

219 


220  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

"  Charlotte  is  a  great  and  an  extraordinary  being  — 
a  real  study  for  me,  and  one  who  could  cause  trouble 
to  a  mind  greater  than  mine.  As  our  intimacy  deepens 
I  gradually  discover  new  points  in  her  character, 
which,  like  lovely  portions  of  some  vast  landscape, 
astonish  and  delight  me."  She,  clever  woman,  filled 
as  she  was  with  enthusiasm  for  the  poet's  genius,  drew 
him  again  within  her  toils.  Already,  on  the  first  day, 
he  was  introduced  to  Frau  von  Imhof,  Frau  von 
Stein's  sister,  who  was  also  living  in  separation  from 
her  husband.  She  instantly  spread  the  news,  at  a 
large  soiree,  that  she  had  met  the  author  of  "  Don 
Carlos."  Another  of  Charlotte's  visitors  was  the  young 
and  talented  Count  Solms,  then  resident  for  a  time  in 
Weimar ;  Schiller  and  he  had  much  pleasant  converse 
together. 

The  poet  lost  no  time  in  calling  upon  different 
people.  Charlotte,  after  her  fashion,  had  told  him 
those  persons  of  note  whose  acquaintance  he  must 
make,  strongly  urging  him  to  hold  his  own  against  the 
magnates  of  Weimar.  He  first  announced  himself  to 
the  veteran  poet  Wieland  in  a  few  lines,  saying  that 
all  his  best  pleasure  in  after-life  would  depend  upon 
his  love  and  good-will.  Wieland,  then  in  his  fifty- 
fourth  year,  was  deeply  engaged  upon  a  translation  of 
Lucian.  He  gave  the  young  poet  a  most  genial  wel- 
come, who  had  turned  more  than  once  to  him  for 
counsel,  and  of  whom  he  had  heard  much  through 
Schwan.  After  two  hours'  conversation,  they  parted 
as  the  best  of  friends.  Wieland  spoke  with  enthusi- 
asm of  their  mutual  influence,  for  he  counted  upon 
Schiller's  staying  a  long  time  in  Weimar,  and  the  poet 
had  said  no  word  of  his  prospects  nor  of  the  scheme 
which  he  had  in  view.  Herder  was  the  next  celebrity 
to  be  visited.  He  had  much  to  attract  Schiller  and  to 
call  forth  his  sympathies.  "  His  conversation,"  he  says, 
"  is  full  of  soul,  full  of  force  and  fire ;  but  he  has  but 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  221 

two  emotions  —  hate  and  love.  He  loves  Goethe  pas- 
sionately —  half  idolatrously."  They  talked  much 
of  Goethe ;  also  of  philosophy  and  politics ;  of  Weimar, 
of  Schubart,  now  finally  set  free,  and  of  Schiller's  own 
quarrel  with  the  Duke  of  Wiirtemberg,  a  tyrant  whom 
Herder  hated.  ^He  asked  the  poet  to  come  often  and 
see  him.  Neither  spoke  of  the  other's  work  in  litera- 
ture. Schiller  believed  that  Herder  had  never  yet  read 
any  of  his  poetry,  though  he  must,  at  least,  have  heard 
of  his  early  plays,  which,  one  and  all,  had  been  given 
at  Weimar.  Schiller  also  called  upon  Einsiedel,  a  man 
of  musical  and  literary  attainments,  who  was  chamber- 
lain to  the  dowager  duchess.  They  spoke  together  of 
the  confederacy  of  German  princes  which  the  duke 
was  so  zealous  to  have  established. 

Charlotte,  who  well  saw  Schiller's  agitated  state, 
first  feigned  a  vivacity  that  bordered  upon  pertness, 
and  he  caught  something  of  her  hilarious  tone.  While 
the  merry  mood  was  still  on  him,  he  got  amusement 
from  a  visit  paid  to  him  by  Vulpius,  the  Weimar  poet, 
who,  after  striving  to  support  his  sisters  and  himself 
by  novel- writing,  had  been  obhged  to  accept  a  secre- 
taryship at  Niirnberg.  We  feel  some  pity  for  the 
poor  crooked  Httle  man  "  in  white  coat  and  yellow- 
green  vest,"  whom  Schiller  thus  summarily  dismissed 
without  a  single  friendly  word,  for  Vulpius  worked 
earnestly  at  his  craft,  and  wrote  only  because  he  had 
to  write. 

On  the  27th  Schiller,  with  Wieland,  accepted  the 
dowager  duchess's  invitation  to  Tiefurt,  where  he  was 
most  graciously  received.  But  the  duchess  made  no 
favourable  impression  upon  our  poet;  he  thought  her 
narrow-minded,  interested  only  in  the  sensuous,  which 
explained  her  taste  for  music,  painting,  and  the  like. 
Perhaps  Charlotte  helped  him  to  form  this  hasty  and 
unsparing  judgment.  With  her  he  went  next  evening 
a  second  time  to  Tiefurt,  to  a  concert  and  a  supper,  at 


222  THE  LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

which  Wieland  and  Count  Solms  were  also  present. 
Charlotte  had  assured  him  that  everywhere  in  Weimar 
his  manners  would  go  down.  Thus  she  was  to  blame 
when  Schiller  so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  address  his 
answer  to  her  instead  of  to  the  duchess,  who  had  asked 
him  a  question.  Returning  that  night  to  his  hotel,  he 
found  Gotter  there,  the  poet,  with  Ettinger,  the  Gotha 
publisher.  He  was  much  discouraged  by  Cotter's  stric- 
tures upon  the  "  Don  Carlos,"  who  then  first  gave  him 
a  notion  of  how  Weimar  would  receive  the  play  he 
himself  so  highly  rated.  Charlotte  relapsed  into  her 
former  nervous,  weakly  state,  and  this  troubled  him 
also.  He  had  just  taken  lodgings  for  three  months 
in  a  house  formerly  owned  by  Charlotte ;  for  two 
rooms  and  a  bedroom  he  had  to  pay  seventeen  thalers 
and  a  half  —  "  a  deal  of  money,"  as  he  called  it.  Then 
he  must  keep  a  servant  at  six  thalers  a  month,  who, 
if  needed,  could  do  copying  work  for  him  also. 

He  dined  on  the  30th  with  Wieland  at  his  club, 
whose  verdict  respecting  the  "Don  Carlos"  he  anx- 
iously awaited.  He  met  Herder  again  in  August,  and 
he  also  promised  an  opinion.  Then  he  went  to  Erfurt 
to  carry  out  the  Aruims'  commission.  He  was  shown 
over  the  convent,  where,  of  course,  he  was  sufficiently 
stared  at.  On  learning  at  the  hotel  who  he  was,  he 
met  with  great  attention  —  was  treated  "  like  a  Chris- 
tian ; "  the  members  of  an  amateur  dramatic  club  met 
together  before  the  door,  though  none  ventured  to 
deliver  an  address.  Governor  von  Dalberg  had  been 
for  a  long  time  absent  from  Erfurt,  being  kept  away 
by  his  new  appointment  at  Mainz.  Schiller  informed 
Jettchen  that  he  had  executed  her  commission,  and 
expressed  hope  of  receiving  a  letter  from  her  soon. 
On  getting  back  to  Weimar,  Gotter  told  him,  to  his 
annoyance,  that  he  had  read  aloud  the  acting  version 
of  "Don  Carlos"  at  Tiefurt,  Wieland  listeniug  with 
the  rest,  and  that  a  portion,  the  first  half  only,  had 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  223 

produced  an  impression,  the  remainder  finding  little 
favour.  This  explained  Wieland's  silence.  Schiller 
had  already  decided  to  spend  some  time  at  Meiningen, 
where  his  brother-in-law  could  secure  lodgings  for  him 
either  in  Frau  von  Wolzogeu's  house  or  elsewhere. 
For  this  reason  he  wrote  to  the  baroness  on  August 
1st.  He  made  excuse  for  having,  through  adverse 
fortunes,  let  four  years  pass  without  yet  paying  his 
debt ;  the  thouglit  of  this  had  often  tortured  him. 
Perhaps  in  a  few  months,  he  said,  his  circumstances 
might  change  for  the  better,  when  probably  he  would 
find  a  friend  willing  to  advance  him  the  money.  This 
was  but  one  of  the  many  transient  schemes  he  was 
for  ever  forming. 

Fortunately  Charlotte  made  speedy  recovery ;  she 
grew  easier  in  mind,  though  their  life  together  was 
not  all  that  Schiller  had  fancied  it  would  be.  He 
wrote  to  Korner  that  the  formation  of  unalterable 
friendship  between  Charlotte  and  himself  depended 
only  upon  his  own  development  of  mind  and  char- 
acter. She  had,  at  least,  a  more  equable  temperament, 
although  she  was  more  capricious  in  mood ;  long  soli- 
tude and  persistent  attachment  to  her  being  had  fixed 
her  image  deeper  in  his  heart  than  his  in  hers.  Korner 
hoped  that  this  quiet  life  together  would  help  to 
cement  their  friendship.  But  Schiller  needed  a  calm- 
ing influence  which  Charlotte,  consumed  as  she  was 
by  nervous  excitement  and  the  distress  of  circum- 
stances, could  never   exercise. 

Wieland  still  held  back,  while  Herder,  on  the  other 
hand, '  spoke  publicly  in  Schiller's  favour  at  the 
duchess's  table.  Herder  at  the  first  had  formed  no 
very  high  opinion  of  Schiller,  but  he  took  now  an 
interest  in  the  young  poet,  and  after  reading  the 
instalments  of  "Don  Carlos,"  his  favourable  impres- 
sions were  confirmed.  Schiller  at  this  time  met  Frau 
von  Stein,  Goethe's  friends  whom  he  held  to  be  the 


224  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

best  of  them  all,  termiug  her  "  truly  singular  and 
interesting."  But  such  was  not  his  judgment  of  Major 
von  Knebel,  Goethe's  most  intimate  friend.  Weimar 
became  distasteful  to  him,  for  it  took  too  much  of  his 
money  and  too  much  of  his  time ;  he  had  also  given 
up  all  hope  that  the  duke  would  provide  him  with 
some  appointment.  Charlotte  would  probably  not  stay 
there  any  longer ;  this  was  to  be  decided  at  the  end  of 
September,  when  her  husband  had  promised  to  come 
to  Kalbsried.  From  his  answer  Schiller  perceived  that 
Kalb's  friendship  for  him  was  unchanged,  although  the 
husband  loved  his  wife,  and  must  have  seen  through 
her  intimacy  with  the  poet.  But  he  trusted  Charlotte 
implicitly ;  it  was  the  world's  opinion  alone  which 
caused  him  fear,  which  made  it  the  harder  for  him  to 
say  nothing. 

Anxiety  about  the  future  now  forced  Schiller  to 
take  up  his  pen,  and  he  began  to  work  at  the  "  Eevolt 
of  the  Netherlands."  "I  am  full  of  my  subject,  and 
work  with  a  will,"  he  writes,  four  weeks  after  reaching 
Weimar.  "  This  will  be,  as  it  were,  my  delmt  in  his- 
tory, and  I  hope  to  produce  something  really  readable." 
He  believed  that  he  would  find  the  necessary  rest  for 
this  at  Meiningen.  But  he  wished  first  to  visit  Jena. 
Wieland's  daughter,  Sophie,  married  to  Professor  Eein- 
hold,  was  staying  at  this  time  with  Charlotte,  who,  on 
the  20th,  took  her  to  Jena.  Schiller  joined  them, 
intending  to  stay  for  a  day  or  two  with  Professor  Piciu- 
hold.  With  this  enthusiastic  apostle  of  the  Kantian 
philosophy  he  sympathised  much,  although  he  must 
have  felt  that  Eeinhold,  to  whom  the  realm  of  fancy 
was  as  a  sealed  book,  could  never  be  his  friend.  Char- 
lotte returned  the  same  evening,  but  Schiller  remained 
there  six  days ;  he  had  felt  nowhere  so  comfortable 
and  at  his  ease.  Writing  to  Korner,  he  says,  "  I  could 
never  be  perfectly  happy  at  any  time  or  in  any  spot ; 
that  you  know ;  for  I  can  never,  while  in  the  present, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  225 

lose  thought  of  the  future.  I  spent  six  idle  days  at 
Jena ;  yet  they  alone  were  enough  to  poison  genuine 
gladness  for  me."  It  was  in  this  town  that  he  made 
the  acquaintance  of  Schiltz  and  Haseland,  the  editors 
of  the  Allgemeine  Literatur  Zeitung.  He  was  pleased 
that  Schiitz,  a  man  of  taste  in  literature,  should  ap- 
prove of  the  "  Don  Carlos  ; "  in  Haseland,  so  he  thought, 
there  lay  the  makings  of  a  great  man.  While  here  he 
also  met  Doderlein  and  Grieshach,  the  theologians. 
He  spent  the  evening  previous  to  his  departure  at  the 
latter's  house,  where  Charlotte,  Eeinhold,  and  many 
more  were  assembled.  Eeinhold  assured  the  poet  that 
before  spring  came  he  could  certainly  get  some  ap- 
pointment at  Jena.  But  Schiller  was  not  tempted  by 
such  a  prospect.  He  wished  to  live  independently, 
but  undivided  from  his  friends,  if  it  were  possible  to 
earn  a  comfortable  livelihood  by  authorship,  a  question 
which  would  be  answered  within  a  year's  time.  It 
was  in  these  days  that  he  sent  his  version  in  iambics 
of  the  "  Don  Carlos  "  to  Mannheim. 

He  celebrated  Goethe's  birthday,  the  28th,  with 
Charlotte,  Frau  von  Imhof,  Frau  von  Schardt,  and  the 
two  eldest  sons  of  Voigt  and  Herder.  They  spent 
the  day  in  the  grounds  of  an  estate  owned  by  Goethe, 
where  Knebel  was  now  living.  Herder  was  absent 
through  illness,  and  Frau  von  Stein  was  at  Kochberg. 
"  We  ate  heartily,"  wrote  Schiller,  "  and  I  drank  to 
Goethe's  health  in  Ehenish.  He  little  thinks,  in  Italy, 
that  he  has  me  among  his  guests,  but  Fate  brings  won- 
drous things  to  pass."  While  taking  Charlotte  thither 
they  met  the  duchess,  with  whom,  however,  only  bows 
were  exchanged.  Schiller  thought  her  without  beauty, 
yet,  in  figure,  tall  and  noble-looking.  Charlotte  had 
told  him  that  with  the  duchess  he  might  be  completely 
himself ;  that  he  would  find  her  full  of  sympathy  for 
the  beautiful ;  she  described  her  even  as  a  zealous 
admirer   of   his   writings.     But    Charlotte    had    often 


226  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

misinformed  him  upon  such  subjects,  and  from  other 
quarters  he  had  heard  that  the  duchess  was  very  proud 
and  reticent,  approachable  only  by  entrance  into  her 
select  circle.  He  had  already  declined  all  advance- 
ment from  the  court ;  he  wished  to  rely  solely  upon 
himself;  to  try  what  he  might,  by  his  own  strength, 
achieve.  On  the  morning  of  Goethe's  birthday  he  had 
just  written  as  follows  to  Huber  : 

"  The  result  of  my  experiences  here  is  that  I  know 
my  weakness,  while  my  soul,  however,  strikes  at  higher 
summits  than  before.  By  industry  and  by  study  I 
can  remedy  the  defects  which  comparison  with  others 
shows  me  I  possess,  and  then  the  joy  of  pure  and  per- 
fect knowledge  of  my  own  entity  will  be  mine.  .  .  . 
Believe  me,  an  immense  deal  lies  within  our  might ; 
we  have  not  measured  our  powers ;  it  is  in  time  that 
these  powers  lie.  To  use  our  time  conscientiously, 
carefully,  may  work  wonderfully  for  us  all.  .  .  .  What 
right  have  we  to  call  fate  or  Heaven  to  account  if  we 
are  less  favoured  than  others  in  the  world  ?  Time 
was  given  to  us ;  a  capital  which,  when  possessed  of 
understanding  and  zeal  of  purpose,  we  have  to  employ 
to  the  best  advantage."  And  accordingly,  from  this 
time  forth,  he  worked  earnestly  to  qualify  himself  for 
earning  "  a  competency  "  within  the  year.  The  project 
of  a  journey  to  Meiningen  was  abandoned,  and  he 
worked  unremittingly  at  the  "  Eevolt  of  the  Nether- 
lands." Even  the  extraordinary  success  which  the 
"Carlos"  had  met  with  in  Schroder's  hands  did 
not  inchne  him  to  make  any  fresh  efforts  in  play- 
writing  ;  and  for  a  time,  at  all  events,  he  gave  up  all 
intention  of  visiting  Hamburg.  He  worked  now  for 
ten  hours  every  day.  Twice  a  week  he  visited  Char- 
lotte ;  on  other  days  he  called  in  turn  upon  Herder, 
Voigt,  Bode,  or  Bertuch,  while  each  Monday  evening 
was  spent  at  the  club.  Of  course  so  much  work 
affected  his  health  and  "  racked  "  his  brain,  but  even 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  227 

in  this  state  of  "  hypochondriacal  despondency  "  he  did 
not  lose  heart.  As  the  coming  of  Charlotte's  husband 
was  delayed,  her  distressful  condition  did  not  change. 
"  What  was  the  point  of  my  coming  here  ? "  he  writes 
gloomily  to  Korner.  "  I  am  so  worn  out  with  medi- 
tating here  upon  that,  I  avoid  bestowing  thought  upon 
the  matter,  and  until  my  present  work  be  finished  I 
have  wholly  given  up  thinking  about  myself." 

At  the  beginning  of  October  the  duke  returned  to 
Weimar.  He  left  again  for  Holland  on  the  evening 
of  the  5th,  before  Schiller  could  have  audience  of  him. 
The  duke  had  himself  asked  for  an  interview,  but 
when  Knebel  told  him  this,  Schiller  must  have  seen 
that  it  was  for  no  very  special  reason  that  his  Grace 
wished  to  speak  with  him. 

The  poet  was  not  able  entirely  to  renounce  all  social 
pleasures.  Since  the  1  st,  a  weekly  Wednesday  gather- 
ing of  the  townsfolk  had  been  organised,  when  they 
all  dined  together,  and  their  amusements  were  cards 
and  dancing.  Schiller,  who  craved  for  distraction, 
gladly  joined  them,  and  even  made  one  of  a  whist 
party  comprising  the  court  singer,  Corona  Schroder,  a 
friend  of  Goethe's,  Carohne  Schmidt,  Haseland,  and 
Riedel.  Their  rubber  was  always  played  at  the 
Wednesday  club  meeting.  His  other  evenings  were 
spent  with  Charlotte,  or  at  Frau  von  Imhof's,  where 
card-playing  also  went  on.  Mile.  Schroder  pleased 
him  by  her  naturalness.  She  gave  him  a  volume 
of  her  own  songs,  while  he,  in  return,  begged  her  to 
keep  as  a  souvenir  the  copy  of  "  Don  Carlos "  that 
he  had  lent  her  to  read.  They  often  met,  and 
Schiller  found  her  society  most  congenial. 

As  a  proof  of  his  present  more  temperate  judgment 
of  others,  we  may  take  the  fact  that  he  also  gave  a 
copy  of  the  "  Carlos,"  together  with  a  most  graceful 
dedication,  to  Carohne  Schmidt,  whom  he  had  formerly 
spoken   of    only  in    a    jocose,  contemptuous    manner. 


228  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

But  still  he  complains  to  Huber  that,  among  so  many 
acquaintances,  he  had  no  friend  to  love,  for  a  female 
friend  could  not  be  reckoned  as  one. 

He  was  still  sorely  pinched  for  money.  The  ex- 
pected fee  from  Dalberg  for  his  "  Carlos "  was  not 
forthcoming,  as  the  play's  production  had  been  delayed. 
His  need  drove  him  to  ask  Crusius,  his  pubhsher,  for 
twelve  louis  d'or  on  account  of  his  history  of  the 
"  Revolt  of  the  Netherlands."  It  was  almost  finished, 
he  said,  and  he  was  just  transcribing  it ;  he  wished  to 
receive  the  rest  of  the  sum  due  to  him  on  the  work  at 
the  New  Year.  Of  course  he  could  not  take  up  Beit's 
bill.  Kbrner  would  have  to  pay  the  interest  thereon 
up  to  Easter,  when  it  must  be  renewed.  Fortunately 
for  him,  he  now  became  reconciled  with  Wieland,  who 
had  reviewed  the  "  Don  Carlos  "  favourably.  Schiller 
joined  the  staff  of  his  journal,  the  Mercur,  and  they 
intended  to  convert  it  into  a  leading  national  organ, 
concerning  which  Eeinhold  had  to  be  consulted. 
Schiller  already  looked  upon  himself  as  "  heir  pre- 
sumptive "  to  the  paper.  He  saw,  too,  a  possibihty  of 
drawing  Korner  to  Weimar. 

He  went  into  a  new  house  at  the  end  of  the  quarter. 
We  are  not  sure  if  it  was  the  one  in  his  neighbour- 
hood recommended  by  Mile.  Schroder.  At  this  time, 
too,  he  made  his  appearance  as  a  Weimar  poet,  by 
writing  a  prologue  which,  at  the  opening  of  the  Bel- 
lomo  Theatre,  was  spoken  by  the  httle  daughter  of 
Neumann,  an  old  Mannheim  friend.  She  was  a  pupil 
of  Schroder's  and  only  nine  years  old.  Korner  tried, 
but  in  vain,  to  draw  him  back  to  Dresden,  saying  that 
he  greatly  wished  for  him,  and  that  it  was  unnecessary 
for  him  to  await  the  uncertain  arrival  of  Charlotte's 
husband.  The  poet  was  now  quite  fascinated  by  the 
pleasant  Wieland  circle,  although,  as  a  man  of  the 
world,  he  thought  himself  out  of  place  among  such 
simple,  inexperienced  people.     This  year  he  spent  his 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  229 

birthday  at  Jena,  whither  he  had  travelled  with  Wie- 
land's  second  daughter.  They  found  Reinhold  ill ;  so 
Schiller  was  obliged  to  visit  him  continually  in  his 
sick-room,  and  could  only  write  to  Korner  that  he  had 
much  weighty  matter  to  impart  to  him.  The  fact  of 
his  having  completed  his  twenty-eighth  year  set  him 
musing.  Immediately  upon  his  return,  Schiller  con- 
sulted Korner  as  to  whether  he  should  take  a  wife  — 
whether  he  should  choose  a  woman  in  all  points  so 
opposite  to  himself  —  one  so  innocent  as  was  Wieland's 
second  daughter.  Korner  counselled  him  to  wait  for 
some  years,  as  his  vivid  imagination  was  overapt  to 
lift  a  passing  fancy  into  a  serious  passion.  When  they 
were  all  come  safely  into  port,  they  would  rejoice  to 
welcome  in  his  wife  a  new  friend  and  a  helpmeet 
worthy  of  him. 

This  well-meant  advice  no  longer  reached  the  poet 
in  Weimar.  On  the  17th  of  November  Charlotte  had 
sone  to  meet  her  husband  at  Kalbsried,  with  whom 
she  returned  after  twelve  days.  During  her  absence 
Schiller  received,  through  his  sister,  a  renewed  invita- 
tion from  Frau  von  Wolzogen,  who  was  then  entertain- 
ing her  son  Wilhelm  and  her  daughter's  betrothed, 
Councillor  von  Lilieustern.  In  spite  of  Schiller's 
many  unfulfilled  promises  to  repay  her  loan,  this 
noble  woman  stiU  regarded  him  as  a  member  of  the 
family,  and  as  a  faithful,  trusted  friend.  She  thus 
wished  him  to  make  Lihenstern's  acquaintance.  This 
time  he  halted  not  in  coming  to  a  decision,  for  he 
wished  greatly  to  see  his  sister  again,  and  in  a  few 
hours  he  was  on  his  way.  The  days  spent  at  Meinin- 
gen,  Bauerbach,  and  in  that  neighbourhood  were  full 
of  enjoyment,  although  none  of  the  places  which,  in 
his  hermit  period,  had  so  strongly  influenced  him,  held 
any  special  interest  for  him  now.  He  was  able  to 
make  the  acquaintance  of  several  noble  families  besides 
that  of  the  Duke  of  Meiningen,  in  whom  he  could  dis- 


230  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

cover  little  that  was  remarkable.  On  the  other 
haud  it  delighted  him  to  find  here  Eeinhard,  the 
artist,  who  drew  his  portrait,  which  proved  a  fairly 
successful  likeness.  Reiuhard  also  promised  to  give 
him  one  of  his  landscapes  of  the  surrounding 
country. 

His  return  journey  he  made  on  horseback  with  Wil- 
helm  von  Wolzogen,  who  induced  him  to  go  by  way  of 
liudolstadt  to  visit  relations  there,  Frau  von  Lengen- 
feld  and  her  two  daughters.  Schiller  had  met  them 
once  before  at  Mannheim.  Caroline,  the  elder,  was 
married  to  a  Herr  von  Beulwitz,  a  cultivated  and  intel- 
lectual man,  full  of  spirit,  but  whose  whims  and  crotchets 
threw  a  shadow  over  their  childless  union.  She  was  a 
blonde,  without  grace  of  form,  or  beauty  of  feature,  but 
her  hands  were  small  and  dehcate  in  shape,  and  her 
fiery  soul  shone  through  deep-set  eyes,  while  her  voice 
was  strangely  musical.  Her  conversation  showed  that 
she  had  intellect  and  sentiment,  and  her  warmth  and 
sincerity  of  manner  were  the  more  charming  by  being 
tempered  with  a  certain  melancholy.  She  suffered 
with  her  nerves,  and  believed  she  would  die  at  an  early 
age;  her  unhappy  marriage  had,  of  course,  a  sadden- 
ing influence  upon  her  life.  She  was  tenderly  attached 
to  Wilhelm  von  Wolzogen;  and  the  Tugenbund,  a 
benevolent  society  in  Berhn,  for  the  spread  of  moral 
and  mental  culture,  and  at  the  head  of  which  stood 
the  beautiful  Henrietta  Herz,  the  wife  of  a  famous 
doctor,  claimed  her  as  an  associate.  Her  sister,  Char- 
lotte, just  turned  twenty-one,  was  tall  and  svelte,  a 
blue-eyed  brunette,  who,  although  without  positive 
beauty,  was  charming  if  only  by  reason  of  her  youth- 
ful grace.  Less  self-reliant  and  with  less  originahty 
than  her  sister,  she  sought  to  have  influence  in  society 
by  her  talents  and  by  a  certain  quiet  charm  of  manner  ; 
she  liked  laughing  at  the  foibles  of  others,  though 
always   most  calm   and   gentle   in   mood,   with  strict 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  231 

regard  for  the  convenances.  In  speaking  she  adopted 
the  fashionable  court-lisp. 

On  a  rainy  winter's  day,  the  6th  of  December,  the 
sisters  saw  two  horsemen,  wrapped  in  cloaks,  riding  up 
the  lonely  road.  In  one  of  them  they  soon  recognised 
their  cousin  Wilhelm.  The  two  dismounted  at  an  inn 
close  by,  and  Wilhelm  shortly  appeared,  to  ask  if,  in 
the  evening,  he  might  bring  in  his  fellow  traveller. 
He  came,  and  among  much  else  the  talk  turned  upon 
the  "Philosophic  Letters,"  which  gave  the  ladies  op- 
portunity of  discussing  the  glowing  description  found 
therein  of  friendship  and  of  love.  They  had  not  yet 
read  the  "  Carlos,"  it  seems.  Schiller,  on  leaving,  an- 
nounced his  intention  of  spending  the  ensuing  summer 
in  this  most  delightfvd  neighbourhood.  Wilhelm  ac- 
companied him  to  Weimar,  and  returned  thence  after 
a  couple  of  days,  to  Eudolstadt. 

Schiller,  in  a  letter  to  the  sisters  two  years  later, 
says :  "  Your  presence  went  with  me  to  Weimar,  but 
it  did  not  yet  bid  me  hope."  On  the  9th  he  wrote  to 
Korner  about  this  journey  and  mentioned  his  Eu- 
dolstadt visit.  "  A  Frau  von  Lengenfeld  \sic'\  lives 
there  with  her  two  daughters,  of  whom  one  is  married 
and  the  other  still  single.  Without  being  beautiful, 
both  are  attractive,  and  please  me  much.  I  find  them 
well  acquainted  with  all  the  new  literature ;  they  are 
refined,  and  have  both  intellect  and  sensibility.  They 
play  the  piano  well,  which  made  my  evening  a  very 
pleasant  one." 

Korner  could  never  guess  that  his  friend's  heart  had 
been  touched  when  Schiller  further  hinted  that  in  six 
or  eight  years  perhaps  the  Fates  would  suffer  him  to 
find  some  more  interesting  maiden  even  than  Fraulein 
Wieland,  saying  that  what  he  had  written  about  her 
was  just  a  mere  passing  thought,  and  should  only  be 
taken  as  such.  "  After  my  30th  [35th  ?]  year  I  shall 
not  marry,"  he  adds.     "  I  have  already  lost  the  in- 


232  THE  LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

clination  for  wedlock ;  I  spoke  in  favour  of  it  from 
motives  of  necessity.  I  could  never  have  happiness 
with  any  woman  of  mark,  or  else  I  do  not  know 
myself." 

In  Weimar  he  found  Charlotte  and  her  husband. 
After  their  first  meeting,  which  was  at  dinner  there, 
with  Wilhelm,  he  seems  to  think  that  the  major  is 
the  same  as  ever ;  but  he  could  see  that  toward  Char- 
lotte the  husband  had  changed,  and  that  this  change 
might  increase.  He  went  oftenest  to  Wieland's  house. 
He  was  deeply  occupied  with  his  "  Eevolt,"  which 
forced  him  to  wade  through  many  a  musty  foho ;  this 
kept  him  from  accepting  Wilhelm's  invitation  to  come 
again  to  Eudolstadt  before  Christmas.  "  Every  hour, 
every  minute,  is  taken  up  until  the  holidays.  Bitter 
necessity,  dear  friend,  compels  me  to  this  sacrifice.  .  .  . 
Next  spring,  I  hope,  will  see  the  fulfilment  of  the 
fondest  of  my  present  desires,  which  is  to  enjoy  a 
lengthened  visit  to  you  and  to  your  dear  surroundings 
at  Rudolstadt.  Commend  me  heartily  to  them." 
Lotte  also  had  ardently  expected  him;  and  she  ap- 
plied the  poet's  message  to  herself. 

Wieland  was  to  print  the  opening  portion  of  the 
"  Eevolt "  in  the  January  number  of  Mercur.  He  an- 
nounced in  December  that  henceforth  Schiller  would 
contribute  to  the  journal,  and  that  possibly  each 
monthly  issue  would  be  graced  by  work  from  his 
hand,  the  hand  which  already  in  its  earliest  essays  had 
betrayed  the  master.  Now,  therefore,  when  the  poet's 
genius  had  touched  a  point  of  maturity,  those  expecta- 
tions, roused  by  "  Fiesco "  and  "  Don  Carlos,"  would 
here  be  justified.  Wieland  also  urged  him  to  turn  his 
"  Oberon  "  into  an  opera,  a  proposal  strongly  condemned 
by  Korner,  who  watched  with  growing  anxiety  Schiller's 
well-nigh  exclusive  attachment  to  Wieland.  The  poet 
was  happy  in  his  present  tranquil  yet  most  active  hfe ; 
he  had  never  felt  more  industrious ;  each  day  had  its 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  233 

twelve  hours  of  work  for  him,  sometimes  even  more. 
It  was  not  until  evening,  generally  at  six  o'clock,  that 
he  went  out,  to  the  Kalbs,  three  or  four  times  weekly, 
who  were  now  constantly  at  court  or  elsewhere. 
Besides  Wieland,  there  were  other  acquaintances  whom 
he  often  visited ;  occasionally,  too,  he  was  at  the 
theatre  or  the  club. 

But  this  incessant  application  of  the  mind  to  one 
subject  affected  his  health ;  he  also  grew  dispirited. 
"  This  mental  overwork  wearies  me,"  he  writes ;  "  I  am 
weakened  by  a  perpetual  warfare  of  my  emotions.  .  .  . 
My  present  labours  are  probably  in  part  to  blame  for 
this.  I  have  to  contend  with  heterogeneous,  often  with 
strange  and  ungrateful  matter,  to  which  I  must  give 
Hfe,  bloom ;  but  from  which  I  draw  none  of  the  needed 
inspiration.  The  aims  to  which  this  work  will  bring 
me  are  what  feed  my  zeal,  are  what  forbid  me  to  halt 
midway."  He  looked  to  win  wider  regard  by  his 
historical,  than  by  his  dramatic  works  ;  this  was  plain 
to  him  from  the  very  unappreciative  way  in  which 
the  "  Carlos "  had  been  received.  Perhaps  in  six 
months,  through  his  history,  he  might  get  an  appoint- 
ment in  Jena,  although  the  low  salary  offered  (two 
hundred  thalers,  a  stipend  which  Eeinhold  had  with 
difficulty  secured  for  his  friend)  would  probably  pre- 
vent his  accepting  it.  But  neither  should  he  wholly 
decline  it,  for  he  wished  first  to  see  whether  his  share 
in  the  Mercur  would  allow  him  to  marry ;  and  a  v^ife 
was  a  possession  that  he  now  considered  absolutely 
necessary.  "  I  need  a  being  about  me  and  belonging 
to  me,  whom  I  can  and  rmist  make  happy,  and  in 
whose  existence  I  can  refresh  my  own.  You  cannot 
know  how  wrecked  is  my  temperament,  how  darkened 
my  brain,  and  all  this,  not  through  outside  misfortune 
(for  in  that  respect  I  am  really  comfortable  here),  but 
through  the  wear  and  stress  of  the  feelings  within  me." 

The  prospect  of  gaining  this  happiness  by  his  works 


234  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

helped  him  to  bear  all  with  patience ;  by  them  he 
hoped  to  do  real  service  to  others ;  and,  in  giving 
charm  to  dull  science,  in  providing  pleasure  where  toil 
was  the  only  outlook,  he  believed  he  would  earn  for 
himself  a  great  and  an  honoured  name.  Korner  and 
he  had  many  discussions  about  this,  but  Schiller  was 
not  to  be  turned  from  his  present  desire  for  work,  nor 
convinced  that  his  despondency  sprang  from  no  need 
of  domestic  life.  He  would  never  be  fit  to  enjoy  this, 
so  Korner  thought,  for  some  years  to  come,  when  he 
should  be  possessed  of  a  certain  calmness,  a  certain 
equability  of  mood.  For  Schiller  was  assuredly  destined 
to  become  a  great  poet,  and  to  this  all  the  cares  in- 
separable from  matrimony  were  thoroughly  opposed. 
Nor  could  Korner  refrain  from  hoping  that  his  friend 
would  wisely  consent  to  spend  the  summer  with  him. 
All  things,  however,  happened  quite  contrary  to  his 
expectation.  One  only  of  the  six  volumes  of  the 
history  was,  after  long  waiting,  completed ;  Schiller 
felt  himself  chained  to  Eudolstadt,  and  later  on  ac- 
cepted a  professorship  without  any  emolument,  merely 
in  order  to  obtain  a  position. 


CHAPTER   II. 

FROM    FEBRUARY    TO    NOVEMBER,    1788. 

On  the  first  February  a  public  fete  was  held  in  hon- 
our of  the  duchess's  birthday.  Schiller  had  composed 
a  poem  for  the  occasion.  There  was  to  be  a  masked 
procession,  and  one  of  a  band  of  priestesses  of  the  Sun 
should  present  his  verses  to  the  duchess.  At  the  com- 
mencement of  the  carnival,  on  the  5th,  he  had  the 
pleasant  surprise  of  meeting  Lotte  von  Lengenfeld,  who 
had  arrived  shortly  before.  He  was  highly  delighted 
to  find  her  here,  amid  the  glittering  masqueraders,  and 
to  be  able  by  right  of  acquaintanceship,  to  spend  many 
happy  hours  at  her  side.  He  was  also  allowed  to 
visit  her  at  Frau  von  Imhof's,  where  she  was  staying. 
But  these  meetings  could  only  occur  rarely ;  and  as 
he  had  no  introduction  to  the  society  in  which  she 
moved,  he  saw  her  but  seldom.  He  was  specially 
anxious  that  Charlotte  von  Kalb  should  have  no  ink- 
ling of  this  attachment.  The  remembrance  of  his 
Dresden  ballroom  acquaintance  probably  made  him 
wary  as  to  any  fresh  infatuation,  which,  as  before, 
would  lead  to  nothing.  Crowded  assemblies  were  least 
of  all  the  place  where  he  could  enjoy  Fraulein  Len- 
genfeld's  society ;  and  besides  he  was  at  this  time  so 
deeply  occupied  with  his  "  Revolt,"  that  he  never  even 
had  leisure  to  visit  the  theatre.  On  one  occasion  he 
was  obliged  to  work  all  night  in  order  to  send  some 
"  copy  "  to  the  printer.     After  finishing  this,  at  three 

235 


236  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

in  the  morning,  he  writes  to  Kdrner :  "  The  masked 
balls  here  and  some  other  gatherings  have  served  to 
distract  rae  a  little  this  week ;  and  I  have  conse- 
quently had  to  make  up  for  lost  time.  .  .  .  The 
masked  balls  are  really  pretty,  —  less  vulgar  than  those 
Dresden  ones,  as  many  of  the  aristocracy  attend  them. 
I  regularly  enjoyed  myself  at  them ;  probably  because 
of  my  numerous  acquaintances  there."  Soon  after  he 
tells  his  friend  that  he  has  not  yet  got  a  wife;  and 
when  he  playfully  asks  them  all  to  pray  that  he  be 
kept  out  of  any  serious  scrape,  it  was  probably  because 
he  felt  this  growing  attachment,  and  knew  that  he 
must  subdue  it.  Although  he  seldom  saw  Lotte,  to  be 
near  her  was  happiness. 

He  now  took  such  pleasure  in  the  writing  of  history 
that  he  deemed  himself  less  a  poet  than  a  politician. 
Then  Goeschen  came  to  Weimar  for  a  week,  with  whom 
Korner  was  displeased,  as  he  had  left  his  first  love  for 
another.  Wieland,  Bode,  and  Bertuch  gave  the  pub- 
lisher hearty  welcome,  and  as  Schiller  was  often  with 
these,  he  had  to  join  their  merry  meetings.  He  glee- 
fully learnt  that  the  edition  of  "  Don  Carlos,"  in  spite 
of  a  reprint  for  the  Vienna  market,  was  nearly  out  of 
print. 

Goeschen,  hearing  that  Crusius  was  about  to  begin 
printing  the  "  Eevolt,"  promised  to  bring  out  the  fifth 
number  of  the  TJialia  at  Easter,  which  should  contain 
the  long-expected  continuation  of  "  The  Ghostseer." 
Schiller  thought  of  finishing  it  with  the  sixth  number ; 
as,  now  that  he  had  the  Mercur  he  could  not  find  time 
to  carry  on  the  other  journal.  He  rarely  had  sight  of 
Lotte ;  he  was  shy  of  interviews,  and  saw  little  chance 
of  ever  making  her  his  wife.  He  liked  most  to  meet 
her  at  Frau  von  Imhof's,  though  they  also  saw  each 
other  at  Charlotte's  house,  where  he  used  to  go  in  the 
evenings,  after  eight  o'clock.  How  greatly  Lotte  cared 
for  his  society  is  seen  from  a  little  note  of  hers,  asking 


THE  LIFE  OF.  SCHILLER  237 

him  to  postpone  his  visit  to  Frau  von  Irahof  until  the 
next  day,  that  lady  being  extremely  busy.  He  had 
sent  her  once  before  a  letter  on  pink  paper,  very  stiffly, 
formally  worded  ;  and  often  in  later  days  Lotte  used 
in  banter  to  remind  him  of  this  pink  billet. 

While  busily  employed  at  his  "  Ghostseer,"  as  he  had 
need  of  money  from  the  Tlialia,  Frau  von  Wolzogen 
told  him  of  his  debt  to  her,  suggesting  that  it  be  re- 
paid at  stated  periods.  On  6th  March  he  sent  her  four 
drafts  payable  at  the  Bookseller's  Fair  next  Michael- 
mas. Unfortunately,  he  was  just  then  very  pressed 
for  money ;  yet  he  hoped  by  Easter  to  be  able  to  send 
her  the  interest.  He  was  at  that  time  so  hard-worked 
that  he  found  no  opportunity  for  letter-writing.  It 
surprised  him  to  hear  that  Crusius  was  rapidly  print- 
ing the  "  Revolt  of  the  Netherlands ; "  Wieland  was 
asking  also  for  a  contribution,  poetical  if  possible,  to 
the  third  number  of  the  Mercur.  Korner,  it  seems,  had 
received  trustworthy  information  about  Schiller's  new 
love-affair,  so  the  poet  wrote  to  him  on  the  6th  of 
March,  saying  he  was  "  as  far  off  such  a  thing  as  ever 
he  was  in  Dresden ; "  only  then  comes  the  statement : 
"  'Tis  true  that  I  lately  let  fall  certain  words  which 
might  have  led  you  to  form  some  conclusion ;  but  this 
slumbers  deep  down  in  my  heart,  and  even  Charlotte, 
who  sees  through  me  and  narrowly  watches  me,  has  as 
yet  no  inkling  of  it.  If  the  affair  should  draw  me  on 
farther,  rest  assured  that  you,  as  in  all  the  serious 
events  of  my  hfe,  will  be  the  first  in  whom  I  shall 
confide." 

Charlotte  at  this  time  was  soon  to  travel  to  Walters- 
hausen  with  her  husband.  Schiller  worked  steadily 
on,  and,  in  spite  of  all  liindrances,  he  in  a  few  days 
produced  the  stirring  poem,  "  The  Gods  of  Greece." 
Speaking  of  this,  he  is  rejoiced  to  find  that  his  muse 
has  not  deserted  him.  Wieland  was  struck  with  the 
poem's  correctness  and  finish,  and  he  drew  Schiller's 


238  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

attention  to  every  little  blemish  which  he  thought 
could  mar  its  effect. 

From  this  vivid  picture  of  a  world  of  deities,  with 
their  joy  in  existence  and  in  things  sensuous,  set  as  it 
is  in  contrast  to  Christian  asceticism  and  a  purely  me- 
chanical conception  of  nature,  we  may  see  that  love 
was  astir  in  the  writer's  heart.  Of  course,  he  was  quite 
out  of  sympathy  with  his  other  work,  "  The  Ghostseer," 
and  could  make  no  progress  with  it.  Again,  it  needed 
much  thought,  he  said,  "  to  create  a  plot  where  plot 
there  was  none,  and  to  knit  together  so  many  broken 
threads."  He  was  rejoiced  to  find  his  zeal  for  history 
waxing  deeper.  Despite  his  limited  means,  he  bought 
Schmidt's  compendious  "  German  History,"  Putter's 
three  volumes  on  the  "  Historical  Development  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  German  Realm,"  and  Montesquieu's 
"  Esprit  des  Lois ; "  for  they  were  works  that  he  must 
needs  possess.  Writing  to  Korner,  he  says :  "  The 
prospect  of  fields  vast  and  unworked  has  such  a 
charm  for  me.  With  each  step  I  advance  in  ideas, 
and  my  soul's  horizon  widens." 

After  Charlotte's  departure  on  the  13th  of  March, 
he  felt  lonely  in  the  evenings,  as  his  work  kept  him 
from  going  out  until  after  eight  o'clock.  He  tells 
Korner  that  "  Wieland's  house,  and  at  all  events  one 
other,  are  at  present  my  only  spots  of  refuge,  except- 
ing, of  course,  the  clubs ;  I  hardly  ever  go  to  the 
comedy."  This  "  one  other  "  house  to  which  he  alludes 
happened  to  be  Frau  von  Imhof's,  and  his  visits  there 
grew  more  and  more  frequent,  although  necessarily 
they  were  made  within  hmits,  for  Lotte's  gossiping 
friend  then  staying  there  might  else  have  told  tales. 
About  the  15th  Lotte,  whom  he  still  always  formally 
addressed  as  gnddiges  Fraulein,  sent  him  her  album. 
He  replied  by  promising  to  write  in  it  next  day,  saying 
too  that  an  engagement  to  play  chess  at  Madame  von 
Koppenfels  alone  kept  him  from  coming  to  her.     He 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  239 

much  hopes  that  Lotte  might  feel  constrained  to  pay 
a  call  there  also.  "  Days  have  a  fairer  light  for  me  on 
which  I  can  hope  to  see  you ;  and  the  prospect  of  such 
days  helps  me  to  endure  gloomy  ones." 

On  the  23d,  Easter  Day,  he  writes  to  Wolzogen  that 
Fraulein  von  Lengenfeld  is  his  favourite  companion ; 
he  means  to  spend  the  greater  part  of  the  summer  at 
Rudolstadt ;  if  his  visits  there  are  too  frequent,  it  is 
Wilhelm  who  is  to  blame.  When  at  Frau  von  Imhof's, 
Easter  eggs  are  given  to  him,  which  in  the  excitement 
of  conversation  he  forgets  to  bring  away ;  pleasant, 
though,  is  such  recollection  of  his  childhood,  and  such 
souvenir  of  the  fair  giver.  When  sending  her  Robert- 
son's "  History  of  Mary  Stuart's  Times,"  he  tells  Lotte 
that  the  work  is  only  lent,  not  given.  To  this  he  adds 
Bode's  translation  of  "  Tom  Jones,"  wherein  the  story 
of  Sophia  Western  would  surely  move  her  tender  sym- 
pathies. He  kept  working  on  incessantly  at  "  The 
Ghostseer."  He  tells  Korner  that  "  few  employments, 
not  excepting  my  correspondence  with  Fraulein  von 
Arnim,  have  ever  seemed  to  me  such  a  sinful  waste  of 
time  as  the  writing  of  this  scribble.  But  it'll  be  paid 
for  at  last ;  and  really,  in  the  whole  thing,  I  have  had 
Goeschen's  advantage  in  view." 

Writing  in  Lotte's  album  was  no  easy  task,  for  he 
dared  not  give  even  the  faintest  expression  to  his  love. 
He  solved  the  difhculty  strangely  enough  by  affirming 
that  all  Lotte's  friends,  who  had  taken  to  themselves 
something  of  her  youthful  beauty  and  innocence,  were 
viewed  by  her  in  the  light  of  her  own  pure  spirit ;  but 
that  they  were  one  and  all  unworthy.  These  ultra- 
gallant  sentiments  —  in  sooth,  a  sorry  compliment  to 
the  young  lady's  friends  —  he  wrote  on  the  back  of  a 
page  where  Frau  von  Kalb  had  expressed  her  joy  at 
finding,  late  though  in  life,  so  fair  a  flower  as  Lotte. 
When  returning  the  album,  on  3d  April,  he  sent  a 
note  with  it,  saying  how  sorry  he  felt  to  have  seen 


240  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

her  so  seldom,  hoping  to  enjoy  her  society  at  Rudol- 
stadt,  and  wishing  to  meet  her  yet  once  more  that 
evening.  Lotte  in  answer  assured  him  that  she  made 
no  distinction  between  new  friends  and  old  ones ;  she 
was  beset,  alas !  by  a  maze  of  difficulties  from  which 
there  was  no  escape,  but  she  felt  all  the  gladder  at  the 
prospect  of  his  stay  with  them  at  Eudolstadt.  He 
must  come  and  see  her  early  in  the  afternoon,  as  she 
was  going  that  evening  to  Frau  von  Stein's.  So  he 
had  his  wish ;  he  met  her  once  more  and  could  hope 
even  that  she  would  remain  for  a  few  days  longer. 
He  was  asked  to  Frau  von  Schardt's  on  the  5th,  but 
excused  himself  from  going,  as  he  knew  Lotte  would 
not  be  there.  She  wrote  to  him  that  same  night  that 
she  was  to  return  next  day  to  Eudolstadt,  and  asked 
for  the  other  volumes  of  Fielding's  romance.  His  com- 
panionship  (as  friendship  was  a  word  he  did  not  like) 
had  given  her  much  pleasure ;  he  must  soon  come  to 
Eudolstadt ;  the  prospect  of  his  visit  made  this  parting 
easier.  As  he  did  not  wish  to  disturb  her  in  all  the 
bustle  of  preparation  for  the  journey,  he  took  his  leave 
in  writing;  it  was  the  fitter  mode  of  giving  his  feel- 
ings expression.  "  Let  but  the  little  seedling  come 
up  "  (the  seedling  of  friendship,  he  meant),  "and  when 
the  suns  of  spring  shine  thereon,  we  shall  know  what 
flower  it  wiQ  bear.  .  .  .  Your  soul,  dear  lady,  I  shall 
one  day  read,  and  I  rejoice  beforehand  at  the  thought 
of  the  beauteous  discoveries  in  store  for  me.  Perhaps 
I  shall  find  that  we  sympathise  on  many  points ;  and 
that  were  for  me  a  discovery  of  infinite  worth."  He 
begged  her  in  all  friendship  to  let  him  tell  her  now 
and  again  when  his  fancy  was  busied  with  her  image ; 
he  absolved  her  from  any  answer  to  his  letters,  yet 
she  must  inform  him  if  he  could  or  could  not  obtain 
the  house  at  Eudolstadt  that  he  had  thought  of  taking. 
Other  than  this,  there  was  no  more  definite  way  of  con- 
fessing to  her  his  new-born  love.     And  Lotte  also  held 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  241 

back  her  affection  ;  she  hardly  realised  that  some- 
thing stronger  than  mere  admiration  and  respect  drew 
her  to  this  gifted  poet. 

Three  days  after  her  departure  Huber  arrived,  who 
had  been  appointed  secretary  to  the  ambassador,  Herr 
von  Biinau,  at  Mainz.  Schiller  rode  with  him  next 
morning  as  far  as  Erfurt,  From  that  place  he  hastened 
to  Gotha,  to  tell  Charlotte  of  Ruber's  coming,  as  he 
wished  her  to  meet  him.  He  called  at  her  house,  but 
she  could  not  see  him,  as  she  was  giving  a  dinner  to 
twelve  starched  dignitaries  whom  Schiller  did  not 
know.  Huber  was  unable  to  make  any  stay,  so  this 
wished-for  meeting  never  took  place ;  nor  could  Schil- 
ler remain  there  longer  himself.  He  wrote  to  Lotte 
immediately  upon  his  return,  assuring  her  of  his  faith- 
ful attachment.  With  the  fine  weather,  his  spirits 
grew  gay ;  he  specially  liked  walking  in  the  Welsch 
garden  to  hear  the  nightingale's  song,  which  reminded 
him  of  the  love  he  carried  at  his  heart.  But  besides 
"  The  Manhater,"  he  had  now  another  original  plot  in 
his  mind,  the  fateful  meeting  of  two  brothers  who  are 
enemies.  It  was  worked  out  many  years  later,  when 
he  wrote  Ms  "  Bride  of  Messina."  At  this  period  he 
contributed  a  few  critiques  to  the  Allgemeine  Literatur 
ZeitiLug,  which  were  gratefully  accepted  by  Hufeland, 
who  invited  him  to  continue  giving  such  help. 

He  now  resolved  more  zealously  than  ever  to  free 
himself  by  degrees  from  every  debt ;  the  thought  of 
this  made  him  glad  and  hopeful,  and  he  looked  for- 
ward with  eagerness  to  the  profits  to  be  reaped  from 
the  second  edition  of  his  "  Rebellion,"  from  a  complete 
version  of  his  dramas,  from  a  collection  of  essays  and 
poems,  as  well  as  from  the  theatre  payments.  He  was 
the  more  annoyed  that  the  Schwan-Gotz  publishing- 
house  in  Mannheim,  which  had  only  paid  him,  and  that 
but  shabbily,  for  the  first  edition  of  his  plays,  should  go 
on  reprinting  them  wholesale,  without  offering  him  the 


242  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

slightest  indemnity,  but  exacting  payment  even  for  the 
copies  supplied  to  him.  He  asked  Korner  whether  he 
were  not  in  need  of  the  sums  which  he  had  generously 
advanced,  and  Korner  satisfied  him  on  that  point, 
telling  him,  besides,  of  his  wife's  successful  accouche- 
ment. Meantime  Charlotte  had  returned  from  Gotha, 
where  she  soon  became  so  suffering  that  she  could  not 
receive  Schiller  when  he  called.  It  was  her  intention 
to  move  to  Kalbsried  vpith  her  relatives  at  an  early 
date. 

About  this  time  Schwan,  who  had  long  kept  silence, 
sent  the  poet  his  portrait,  and  observed  in  his  letter 
that  Margareta  still  remembered  him.  Schiller's 
whole  answer  to  this  was  written  with  a  rare  cour- 
tesy, behind  which  there  lurked  a  certain  humour,  as 
he  gave  his  quondam  friend  a  sketch  of  his  present 
life  of  comfort  and  ease.  He  speaks  quite  temperately 
of  the  unfavourable  reception  at  Mannheim  of  "  Don 
Carlos,"  which  Dalberg  had  arbitrarily  revised  and 
altered.  His  tone  is  that  of  a  man  conscious  of  his 
o^vn  powers,  who  hints  plainly  enough  that  if  there 
has  been  failure,  the  blame  rests  for  the  most  with 
others.  He  learnt,  though,  that  the  play  had  found 
greater  favour  upon  its  second  performance,  when  even 
further  abridged. 

Lotte  had  meanwhile  taken  rooms  for  Schiller  in  a 
pleasant  house  at  Volkstiidt,  a  httle  village  some  short 
distance  from  Rudolstadt,  and  she  had  told  him  of  the 
pleasure  she  foresaw  from  his  companionship.  He 
only  waited  for  fine  weather  and  for  the  completion  of 
various  petty  affairs,  before  following  the  wish  of  his 
heart.  Ere  leaving  he  was  to  make  the  veteran  Glein's 
acquaintance,  who  for  several  days  had  been  the  guest 
of  Herder.  Thus  he  again  came  into  closer  contact 
with  that  poet,  and  was  drawn  afresh  into  social  and 
literary  circles.  The  number  of  the  Thalia  had  just 
appeared,  containing  a  part  of   his  "  Ghostseer."     It 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  243 

made  a  gi'eat  stir.  All  spoke  of  it,  and  the  poet  was 
covered  with  praise.  He  would  profit  by  the  public 
interest  this  story  had  aroused,  and  determined  to  make 
it  as  long  as  possible,  thereby  earning  the  more  money. 
Besides  going  on  with  "  The  Ghostseer,"  which  would 
probably  cover  some  thirty  sheets  of  letterpress,  he 
looked  to  complete,  while  at  Rudolstadt  the  first  por- 
tion of  his  "  Revolt,"  and  also  to  write  its  sequel. 
Then,  too,  he  must  finish  "  The  Manhater,"  or  work 
out  his  plot  for  "  The  Hostile  Brothers,"  besides  send- 
ing contributions  to  the  Mercur  and  the  Liter atur 
Zeitung.  Moreover,  he  hoped  to  have  leisure  for  read- 
ing and  study. 

Hardly  had  the  weather  improved  when,  on  the  18th 
or  19th,  he  hastens  to  Rudolstadt,  staying  overnight  at 
the  hotel  there.  Next  he  sends  to  ask  Lotte  for  the 
address  of  his  landlord,  and  to  know  at  what  hour  he 
might  call  upon  them.  He  could  then  forward  his 
luggage  without  delay  and  get  into  the  rooms  before 
noon. 

Writing  to  Korner  a  week  later,  he  describes  his 
pleasant  home.  "  The  village  is  in  a  small  but  charm- 
ing valley,  through  which  the  Saale  flows  between 
gently  sloping  hills.  From  these  I  get  a  most  delight- 
ful view  of  the  town,  which  lies  curled  at  the  foot  of  a 
mountain  ;  one  may  sight  it  from  afar  by  its  princely 
castle,  set  high  upon  the  rock's  summit,  and  I  am  led 
to  it  by  a  pretty  foot-path,  which  runs  along  the  river 
through  gardens  and  corn-fields."  The  house  where 
Schiller  lived  is  now  wholly  changed ;  yet  the  wild 
mountain-top,  covered  with  rugged  stone  and  brush- 
wood, whither  he  often  used  to  wander,  was  jealously 
guarded  for  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  his  death  by 
Chamberlain  Werlich,  in  affectionate  remembrance  of 
the  great  poet.  And  now  the  "  Schiller's  Height "  is 
under  princely  care. 

He  had  no    other  acquaintances  here   besides   the 


244  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Lengenfelds  and  the  Beulwitzes.  Frau  von  Lengenfeld 
and  her  son-in-law,  Herr  von  Beulwitz,  lived  in  houses 
adjoining  each  other  in  the  New  Street,  behind  which 
a  garden  stretched  westwards.  Schiller  confided  to 
Korner  his  affection  for  Lotte ;  his  friend  had  already 
divined  it.  But,  said  the  poet,  he  would  most  earnestly 
seek  to  avoid  becoming  very  closely  attached  to  the 
house,  or  too  exclusively  devoted  to  any  one  of  its  in- 
mates; such  a  thing  might  happen  if  he  were  wholly 
to  let  himself  go.  "  For  it  would  be  about  the  very 
worst  time  if,  through  such  a  distraction,  I  were  now 
to  destroy  all  the  little  order  into  which,  by  dint  of 
labour,  I  had  got  my  head,  my  heart,  and  my  affairs." 
It  behoved  him  first  of  all  to  earn  all  that  he  possibly 
could  by  his  pen,  so  as  to  free  himself  by  degrees  from 
debt. 

Schiller  used  to  go  to  the  Lengenfelds  regularly  each 
evening  at  six  o'clock.  Sometimes  he  came  earlier, 
when  invited  to  do  so,  or  later  if  the  family  were  out 
on  a  visit,  or  if  he  himself  had  more  work  to  finish. 
He  long  kept  recollection  of  the  road  from  his  house 
to  theirs.  When  crossing  the  bridge  over  the  Schaal- 
bach,  he  could  see  the  mountains  beyond  the  Saale  in 
the  red  light  of  evening ;  Rudolstadt  lay  in  the  fore- 
ground ;  and,  from  afar,  he  could  descry  the  green 
pavilion  of  the  Lengenfelds'  garden.  The  two  sisters 
would  often  come  to  meet  him  as  far  as  this  bridge. 
On  Fridays  only  he  used  generally  to  absent  himself, 
for  then  the  Lengenfelds  had  company  and  the  two 
young  princes  were  among  their  guests.  Everybody 
spoke  French  on  these  occasions,  yet  Schiller  used  to 
come  if  there  was  to  be  a  French  comedy  acted  in  the 
garden.  He  took  several  pleasant  excursions  with 
the  family  to  various  parts  of  the  neighbourhood.  For 
him  it  was  best  when  alone  with  the  two  sisters,  but 
the  mother  and  her  son-in-law,  Von  Beulwitz,  were 
generally  present. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  245 

Beulwitz  was  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of  Schiller's  ; 
his  crotchets,  however,  and  his  ill-humour  did  much  to 
damp  the  spirits  of  the  circle,  and  earned  him  a  nick- 
name — "  The  Bear."  Lotte  from  her  prudence  and 
forethought  was  playfully  christened  "  Wisdom  ;  "  while 
Carohne,  who  liked  tranquillity,  they  called  "  Comfort." 
In  her,  a  woman  of  intellect  and  culture,  Schiller  found 
much  to  attract  him,  yet  the  simpler  grace  and  charm 
of  her  sister  had  won  his  affections.  He  might  not 
show  this,  however,  but  discreetly  sought  to  give  each 
an  equal  share  of  his  attention. 

"  Both  sisters  have  a  touch  of  rhapsody,"  he  tells 
Korner,  "  but  in  each  this  is  kept  under  by  intellect 
and  tempered  by  mental  culture.  The  younger  sister 
is  not  wholly  free  from  a  certain  coquetterie  d'esprit,  but 
there  is  a  discretion,  a  measure  in  such  vivacity  which 
is  more  pleasing  than  otherwise.  I  like  to  talk  of 
serious  things,  of  mind-workings,  of  impressions ;  here, 
I  can  do  this  to  my  heart's  content,  and  can  as  easily 
rebound  to  the  humourous  and  absurd."  As  Schiller 
hid  his  feelings  thus,  and  seemed  equally  intimate  with 
the  one  sister  as  with  the  other  —  nay,  as  Caroline 
from  her  superior  intellect  appeared,  if  anything,  to 
attract  him  the  more,  Lotte  hesitated  also,  wavering 
between  the  sweet  joy  of  believing  herself  loved  and 
the  doubt  as  to  whether  he  felt  any  real  affection  for 
her.  Schiller,  again,  thought  her  reserve  was  due  to 
indifference. 

Lotte  was  a  skilful  draughtswoman,  and  both  the 
sisters  delighted  the  poet  by  their  musical  talent.  The 
chief  source  of  their  entertainment  was  reading; 
French  and  English  works  had  place  in  their  library. 
Schiller  was  but  slightly  familiar  with  Enghsh,  but 
neither  Shaftesbury  nor  Bacon  even  could  terrify  his 
fair  companions.  They  discussed,  among  much  else, 
his  "  Philosophic  Letters  "  and  those  portions  already 
printed  of  the  "  Eevolt."     He  might  speak,  too,  as  he 


246  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

liked  about  religious  matters.  One  morning,  when 
Lotte  with  her  mother  and  sister  had  gone  to  confession, 
she  told  Schiller  that  he  would  have  laughed  at  her,  for 
she  looked  as  venerable  and  saintly  as  a  nun ;  it  was 
only  her  dress,  though,  that  seemed  so.  Schiller  gave 
her  strictly  pious  mother  an  English  Bible  in  which  he 
had  dared  to  copy  some  lines  from  his  elegy  upon  Wecker- 
lin,  saying  that  they  would  certainly  meet  hereafter 
though  maybe  not  in  the  dreamland  of  wiseacres,  not 
in  the  paradise  of  the  mass.  She  might  see  from  this 
at  least  that  he  was  not  an  atheist.  Now  and  again 
the  poet  could  not  help  showing  Lotte  signs  of  his 
affection,  but  she  took  it  for  mere  gallantry  on  his 
part. 

Among  the  acquaintances  he  had  made  through  the 
Lengenfelds  were  the  hereditary  prince's  two  sons  and 
Minister  von  Ketelhodt.  The  last  named,  ever  eager 
to  know  celebrities,  put  his  rich  library  at  the  poet's 
disposal,  entertained  him  at  supper,  and  sent  a  servant 
to  escort  him  back  to  Volkstadt.  It  was  a  great  de- 
light for  Schiller  when  his  friend  Wolzogen  arrived  at 
Kudolstadt  on  a  visit.  He  asked  Frau  von  Kalb  to 
come  thither  also,  but  she,  who  saw  not  without 
jealousy  how  rootedly  attached  he  was  to  the  place, 
simply  excused  herself.  Soon  after  she  went  back  to 
Weimar,  where,  to  Schiller's  annoyance,  people  were 
already  speaking  of  his  relations  with  Friiulein  von 
Lengenfeld.  This  he  had  discovered  from  one  of  Wie- 
land's  letters.  Frau  von  Kalb  contemptuously  stated 
that  Lotte  could  not  enslave  him  for  long. 

It  was  a  sad  blow  to  Schiller  when  the  news  reached 
him  that  his  kind  friend,,  the  Baroness  Wolzogen,  had 
died  suddenly  on  the  5  th  of  August,  after  a  successful 
operation.  Her  son  besought  him  to  write  some  verses 
upon  the  deceased,  or,  better  stni,  to  come  to  him 
speedily,  for  he  needed  a  friend  in  his  distress. 

But  Schiller  proposed   that    Wilhelm    should   visit 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  247 

Rudolstadt,  and  promised  to  ride  as  far  as  Ilmenau  to 
meet  him.  It  was  too  late  now,  he  said,  for  a  poem, 
but  he  had  thought  of  another  way  in  which  to  show 
honour  to  the  memory  of  her  who  was  gone,  who  had 
been  as  a  mother  to  him.  "  For  long  past,"  he  wrote, 
"  we  have  already  been  linked  together  by  the  bond  of 
tenderest  friendship ;  let  us,  then,  in  all  brotherly 
affection,  strengthen,  cement  even  closer,  if  possible, 
this  bond.  We  will  be  as  brothers  to  each  other.  .  .  . 
You  need  sympathy,  comfort,  distraction.  Come,  then, 
and  find  this  with  us ! "  But  Wolzogen  was  imfor- 
tunately  so  pressed  for  time  that  he  found  it  impossible 
to  visit  Rudolstadt  before  travelling  to  Paris,  nor  could 
Schiller  at  the  moment  get  away. 

During  the  eleven  weeks  spent  at  Volkstadt,  he  had 
certainly  made  far  less  progress  with  his  work  than  he 
had  intended.  On  the  5th  July  we  hear  that  the 
first  part  of  the  "  Revolt "  will  be  finished  in  ten  days' 
time ;  he  had  worked  so  hard  at  it,  though,  that  he 
would  absolutely  need  a  pause.  He  felt  afresh  his 
power  for  dramatic  composition.  He  was  sure  of  the 
success  of  his  "  Man-hater,"  but  its  plot  must  be  thor- 
oughly worked  out  ere  he  should  put  pen  to  paper. 
Yet  this  was  never  done,  though  he  looked  forward 
with  pleasure  to  its  performance  at  Hamburg  during 
the  coming  autumn.  Nor  had  he  satisfactorily  finished 
the  first  volume  of  his  history,  while  with  "  The  Ghost- 
seer  "  no  progress  was  made.  The  greater  part  of  this 
was  to  appear  in  Tlialia,  and  he  would  complete  it 
afterward  in  separate  form.  He  only  wrote  the  first 
four  of  a  series  of  letters  upon  Posa's  character  in  "  Don 
Carlos,"  which  he  had  promised  to  Wieland  for  the 
Mercur,  and  to  Pandora  he  contributed  a  humour- 
ous poem,  entitled  "  The  Famous  Woman."  Of  the 
twenty  critiques  for  the  Literatur  Zeitung,  not  a  line 
was  written,  except  perhaps  the  introduction  to  an 
essay  on  Goethe's  "  Egmont." 


248  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

He  had  already  been  suffering  frequently  from  colds, 
so  as  to  be  sometimes  compelled  to  go  in  a  chaise  to 
Rudolstadt.  In  the  early  part  of  August  a  more 
serious  attack  made  him  more  sensible  of  his  loneli- 
ness, and  he  longed  passionately  for  Lotte.  Fearing  to 
be  hindered  all  too  often  from  seeing  her  family,  he  de- 
termined to  take  up  his  quarters  at  Rudolstadt  before 
the  shooting  season  should  begin  on  the  19th.  His 
lodging  was  quite  close  to  the  Lengenfelds'  house. 
On  the  19th  he  dined  with  them,  but  kept  away  from 
the  prince's  ball  given  that  next  night,  to  which  Lotte 
had  greatly  looked  forward.  In  a  note  of  his,  written 
on  the  following  morning,  there  was  a  tone  of  jealousy 
and  discontent.  He  was  vexed,  too,  at  the  thought 
of  Lotte's  projected  visit  to  Kochberg,  and  the  news  of 
Korner's  ill-health  also  troubled  him.  While  in  such 
a  frame  of  mind,  he  warned  his  friend  that  he  would 
gain  little  benefit  from  his  society. 

"  Heart  and  head  throb  ever  and  alwavs :  I  can  at  no 
moment  call  myself  happy,  at  no  moment  say  that  I 
have  joy  in  living.  .  .  .  There  have  been  many  social 
pleasures  for  me  here,  but  now,  when  I  must  break 
away  again  from  them,  present  enjoyment  is  spoiled 
for  me  by  thoughts  of  the  future.  Were  my  blood  but 
a  little  less  heated,  I  should  be  a  happy  man."  This 
was  but  one  of  those  sudden  and  frequent  fits  of  de- 
pression caused  by  hopeless  passion  for  Lotte,  a  passion 
which  hindered  all  serious  literary  work,  which  robbed 
him  of  aU  intellectual  power.  "  My  history,"  he  com- 
plains, "  has  destroyed  much  of  the  poetry  within  me, 
and  this  journalism  is  all  too  unsettling  work.  The 
time  is  no  more  when  I  could  bring  all  my  mental 
force  to  bear  upon  one  subject  only."  Leaving  aside 
"  The  Man-hater,"  he  got  interested  in  the  plot  of  "  The 
Hostile  Brothers,"  which  might  be  treated  in  "  the 
Greek  manner,"  for  the  classic  style  in  its  grand  sim- 
plicity counted  for  all  to  him  now.       For  some  time 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  249 

past  he  had  read  only  Homer,  the  Iliad  in  Stolberg's 
prose  translation,  and  Voss's  version  of  the  Odyssey, 
with  which  latter,  despite  the,  to  him,  detestable  hex- 
ameters, he  was  greatly  charmed.  He  only  found 
delight  in  the  ancients  now,  and  felt  how  thoroughly 
he  needed  their  writings  to  refine  his  taste,  which  had 
become  vulgarised  by  tricks,  by  mannerisms,  by  tawdry 
wit.  He  had  lost  all  interest  in  his  story,  "  The  Ghost- 
seer  ; "  it  repelled  him ;  yet,  on  account  of  the  Thalia, 
he  must  continue  with  it.  At  this  time  he  became 
acquainted  with  Rudolph  Zacharias  Becker,  a  literary 
man  whose  qualities  seemed  to  Schiller  of  high  worth. 

He  ever  yet  lacked  the  courage  to  declare  his  love. 
One  evening  he  found  Lotte  in  deep  agitation,  owing 
to  some  disagreement  with  her  mother.  She  told  him 
in  CaroHne's  momentary  absence  what  had  occurred, 
and  of  the  bitter  injustice  she  had  suffered.  SchUler 
affectionately  comforted  her,  and  begged  her  not  to 
take  the  matter  overmuch  to  heart.  In  her  emotion 
she  warmly  pressed  his  hand  to  show  her  gratitude  for 
his  sympathy.  It  was  then  that  he  first  thought  she 
loved  him,  but  with  Caroline's  return  the  chance  to 
make  confession  of  his  own  feelings  had  been  lost. 

On  the  last  day  of  August,  Lotte  went  to  Kochberg 
to  stay  for  some  days  with  Frau  von  Stein.  Her  absence 
was  to  Schiller  intolerable.  He  consulted  her  mother 
and  sister  as  to  how  he  might  remain  in  their  neigh- 
bourhood, when  Jena,  among  other  places,  was  sug- 
gested. Lotte  still  wrote  too  coldly,  he  thought  ; 
albeit,  it  was  prettily  said,  her  wish  that  Fate  might 
permit  him  to  stay  near  her  home,  and  give  them 
happy  and  dehghtful  days. 

"  Ah !  could  I  do  something  toward  beautifying  your 
life,"  he  answers,  "  I  believe  that  my  own  would  be 
dearer  to  me,  then.  What  is  there  nobler  and  more 
pleasant  than  to  help  a  beautiful  soul  to  enjoy  its  own 
beauty,  and  for  me  what  thing  more  desirable  than  to 


250  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

watch  your  mind  in  all  its  varied  aspects,  and  to  feel 
it  near  me  and  about  me  for  evermore  !  When  you  are 
happy  it  is  not  you  alone  who  are  so.  I  cannot  thus 
easily  yield  to  necessity,  as  you  —  as,  indeed,  all  your 
sex  can.  I  always  feel  that  I  must  vanquish  the  fate 
that  would  snatch  me  from  your  circle."  Schiller, 
grown  bolder  now  on  paper,  was  in  a  fair  way  to  dis- 
close his  love.  On  the  5th  of  September  Lotte  re- 
turned, telling  them  that  Goethe  had  been  staying  at 
Kochberg  with  Frau  von  Schardt,  and  that  he  and 
some  other  guests  were  coming  on  to  Kudolstadt  in  a 
couple  of  days.  So  Scliiller  was  now  to  meet  the 
great  and  famous  poet,  whom  all  admired,  whom  some 
envied,  and  whom  vulgar  flattery  had  not  spared.  Be- 
fore this  they  had  exchanged  polite  greetings ;  Goethe 
had  even  courteously  informed  Schiller  that  he  would 
have  visited  him  upon  the  return  journey,  had  he 
known  that  the  poet  lived  so  close  to  his  route.  There 
was  warfare  at  this  time  within  Goethe's  soul  —  he 
was  playing  a  part ;  he  was  hiding  from  others  the  love 
which  gladdened  him ;  Frau  von  Stein  was  wrathful 
with  him,  and  her  presence  must  have  been  galling  ; 
yet  of  all  this  Schiller  could  know  nothing.  Goethe 
was  most  affable  to  every  one,  and  during  an  excursion 
to  the  Saale  he  walked  at  Schiller's  side.  But  they 
found  no  opportunity  for  closer  converse.  All  were 
charmed  by  Goethe's  vivid  descriptions  of  his  stay  in 
Italy.  On  the  table  lay  a  number  of  the  Mercur,  con- 
taining "  The  Gods  of  Greece  ; "  glancing  at  it,  he  asked 
permission  to  take  it  away  with  him.  When  the  com- 
pany dispersed  that  night,  Schiller,  who  instead  of 
kindly  patronage  had  expected  a  far  heartier  display 
of  sympathy,  assured  himself  that  they  would  never 
grow  more  intimate.  He  was  disappointed  even  in 
Goethe's  outward  appearance,  who,  shorter  somewhat 
than  our  poet,  walked  very  straight,  with  shoulders 
thrown  back.     Schiller,  who  himself  was  ungainly  in 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  251 

carriage,  thought  this  stiff,  and  there  were  many  who 
agreed  with  him.  Goethe's  face  wore  a  look  of  reserve, 
it  seemed,  though  his  eyes  were  full  of  expression  and 
vivacity,  and  his  features,  if  grave,  benevolent  and 
kindly.  But  though  this  meeting  in  no  way  lessened 
the  high  esteem  which  Schiller  had  for  Goethe,  he 
still  felt  so  little  drawn  toward  him,  that  he  was 
anxious  to  find  cause  for  their  mutual  want  of 
sympathy,  though  this  was  certainly  not  to  be  ascribed 
to  their  personal  acquaintanceship.  Goethe  saw  in 
Schiller  a  man  of  pleasant  manners,  and  he  was  not 
slow  to  notice  the  marked  impression  that  he  had 
made  upon  the  Lengenfelds.  But  Goethe,  as  we  have 
said,  was  absorbed  by  his  own  emotions ;  he  could  not 
go  outside  himself  to  take  interest  in  others ;  thus  the 
two  failed  to  come  nearer  each  to  each.  That  their 
views  were  at  variance  respecting  dramatic  poetry  was 
clear  to  Goethe  when  reading  soon  after  a  critique  upon 
his  "Egmont"  from  Schiller's  pen,  who  found  the 
morale  of  the  play  quite  excellent,  though,  in  poetry, 
it  stood  behind  others  of  its  class.  The  writer  after- 
ward heard  that  Goethe  had  thought  most  highly  of 
this  essay. 

Schiller  found  it  still  impossible  to  summon  up  full 
energy  for  work ;  he  managed  to  send  Wieland  some 
trifling  contributions  for  the  Mercur,  who  thanked  him 
heartily  for  them,  and  the  letters  upon  "  Don  Carlos  " 
were  also  to  be  continued.  In  the  first  heat  of  temper 
he  had  meditated  upon  a  retort  to  Stolberg's  foolish 
criticism  of  "  The  Gods  of  Greece ; "  but  though  en- 
couraged to  this  by  Wieland,  he  let  the  matter  rest. 

The  lengthy  absence  of  Lotte  and  her  family  made 
him  very  melancholy.  Toward  the  middle  of  the 
mouth  he  was  laid  up  for  a  fortnight  with  rheumatic 
fever,  suffering  also  acutely  from  toothache,  which  made 
all  mental  effort  impossible.  By  the  1st  of  October  he 
was  so  far  restored  as  to  be  able  to  write  to  Kdrner. 


252  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

He  tells  him  that  his  spirit  has  kept  all  its  buoyancy, 
despite  the  trouble  aud  pain  through  which  it  has 
passed.  He  would  ever  strive  to  shake  himself  free 
from  every  trivial  annoyance,  so  as  to  save  for  his  own 
enjoyment  all  his  time  and  the  whole  force  of  his 
being ;  he  would  return  to  Weimar  calm  in  mind,  and 
with  the  resolutions  of  a  man.  He  had  to  hide  from 
his  friend  that  love  was  the  disquieting  element  with 
him ;  he  scarcely  dared  confess  this  even  to  himself. 
He  had  determined  not  to  leave  Eudolstadt,  now  so 
dear  a  spot  to  him,  until  after  his  birthday,  and  Char- 
lotte's entreaties  to  come  back  to  Weimar  were  made 
in  vain. 

During  his  time  of  ill  health,  Frau  von  Laroche's 
son  arrived  on  a  visit,  to  make  Caroline's  acquaintance. 
He  much  interested  the  sisters  by  his  account  of  a  stay 
made  with  his  mother  in  England.  Her  religious 
writings,  however,  edified  him  as  little  as  they  did 
Schiller  and  the  others.  Hardly  had  the  poet  recov- 
ered health,  when  he  chose  the  first  beautiful  autumn 
day  to  go  to  Volkstadt,  to  arrange  what  papers  had 
been  left  there,  and  to  get  calm  enjoyment  from  the 
fair  landscape  around  him.  He  stayed  there  until  the 
next  day.  It  was  then  that  his  hymn  to  Nature  was 
composed,  which  was  later  printed  in  TJialia  with  the 
title  "  In  October,  1788."  "  The  Artists  "  was  probably 
also  begun  here,  or  at  least  the  idea  originated  for  its 
after-development. 

In  a  letter  to  Lotte  he  says  that  this  beautiful  day 
had  made  him  think  of  their  parting,  now  near  at  hand. 

"  It  is  gone  by,  this  beautiful  summer,  and  with  it 
much  of  my  joy.  You  are  going  back  there,  in  a  short 
time  [he  means  to  Kochberg],  and  in  one  respect  it  is 
a  good  thing  for  me.  Yet  see  that  you  soon  return  — 
that  I  may  at  least  be  able  to  bid  you  farewell.  I 
know  not,  but  I  have  no  great  faith  in  the  future.  Is 
this  a  presentiment  ?     Or  is  it  only  low  spirits  ?     Now, 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  253 

you  must  keep  this  note.  Maybe  it  is  presentimeut, 
but  to-day  I  have  no  wish  to  think  more  about  it," 
When  she  goes  to  spend  a  week  with  Frau  von  Stein 
at  Kochberg,  he  finds  the  days  most  tedious  without 
her,  yet  he  cares  not  to  meet  her  there,  surrounded  by 
strange  faces  in  society,  where  they  could  be  but  as 
nothing,  the  one  to  the  other.  He  rejoices  to  know 
that  she  thinks  of  him.  He  says :  "  Men  better  than  I 
you  will  find  everywhere ;  but  I  challenge  all  to  say 
that  they  have  kindlier  feeling  for  you  than  I."  Dur- 
ing Lotte's  absence,  he  at  length  sent  his  publisher 
the  conclusion  of  Volume  I.  of  the  "  Revolt  of  the 
Netherlands,"  and  a  line  of  news  about  the  first  volume 
of  the  "  History  of  the  RebelHon,"  for  which  he  had 
not  yet  been  able  to  furnish  a  preface ;  neither  had  he 
completed  his  sketch  of  the  Fiesco  conspiracy. 

When,  on  the  17th,  Lotte  came  back,  he  spent  some 
pleasant  days  with  the  sisters.  Frau  von  Kalb  was 
annoyed  that  he  did  not  come  to  her,  in  spite  of  such 
urgent  request.  "  I  will  not  unsay  my  former  judg- 
ment of  her,"  he  writes  to  Korner,  "  she  is  noble  and 
full  of  intellect,  but  her  influence  upon  me  has  not 
been  for  good." 

He  felt  this  the  more,  now,  in  the  society  of  these 
charming  sisters,  who,  it  must  be  confessed,  had  kept 
him  idle,  so  that  his  literary  earnings  were  considerably 
lessened.  From  Korner  came  reminders  about  Beit's 
bill  and  a  tailor's  account.  Seeing  that  Schiller  could 
not  pay,  and  wishing  to  save  the  expense  which  another 
delay  would  cause,  he  discharged  the  debt  himself,  while 
letting  his  friend  believe  that  he  had  only  renewed  the 
bill  (wliich  now  amounted  to  280  thalers)  until  the 
New  Year.  "  If  each  month  you  can  pay  off  something 
beforehand,"  wrote  he,  "  you  gain  five  per  cent."  But 
Schiller  had  to  tell  him  that  he  had  been  obliged  to 
borrow  of  Wieland  or  Goeschen,  merely  in  order  to  get 
every-day  necessities.     This  shows,  then,  how  little  his 


254  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

impecuniosity  could  oblige  him  to  write.  In  the  course 
of  tlie  year  three  more  numbers  of  the  Thalia  might 
probably  be  issued ;  he  was  also  to  complete  a  newly 
begAiu  translation  of  tlie  "  Iphigenia  in  Aulis "  of 
Euripides.  This  would  exercise  his  powers  as  drama- 
tist, it  would  show  him  more  of  the  spirit  of  the 
Greeks,  and  insensibly  he  would  catch  something  of 
their  manner.  "  I  am  economising  greatly,  and  shall 
do  so  even  more,"  he  says  in  answer  to  Korner's  warn- 
ing. "  I  am  deeply  anxious  to  set  my  affairs  straight 
in  some  degree.  Perhaps  Goeschen  will  advance  me 
all  the  money."  He  has  intentions  of  paying  the  sum 
owing  to  the  deceased  baroness  to  Wolzogen's  lawyers, 
and  "  with  God's  help,  at  Easter  to  make  a  thoroughly 
fresh  start." 

Schiller's  last  days  at  Rudolstadt  were  of  course 
saddened  by  the  thoughts  of  parting.  He  wrote  to 
Lotte  at  this  time  :  "  Let  this  fair  hope  gladden  us, 
that  we  have  founded  something  for  eternity.  This 
from  the  first  has  been  my  conception  of  our  friendship, 
and  each  day  has  made  it  a  clearer,  a  more  certain 
one." 

When  Lotte  sent  him,  as  keepsake,  a  little  sketch, 
he  told  her  that  it  should  hang  before  his  writing-table, 
to  remind  him  on  many  a  lonely  evening  of  the  kindly 
influence  of  one  who  had  passed  thus  swiftly  across  his 
life.  It  often  seemed  to  him  that  he  had  said  much, 
overmuch,  yet  again  he  felt  that  he  could  and  would 
have  said  more ;  time,  however,  would  bring  all  things 
to  ripeness.  On  the  eve  of  his  birthday  he  read  his 
poem,  "  The  Artists,"  to  the  sisters,  which  they  greatly 
appreciated.  Next  day  they  sent  him  their  good 
wishes  and  congratulations  in  writing.  He  did  not 
arrive  at  their  house  until  five  in  the  afternoon,  and 
Lotte  then  presented  him  with  a  bouquet.  They  spent 
a  pleasant  evening,  enlivened  by  music,  although  the 
thought  of  his  departure  during  that  same  week  sad- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  255 

dened  them  all.  The  sisters  were  also  leaving  Eudol- 
stadt  for  a  time,  having  been  invited  to  stay  with 
friends  at  Erfurt.  The  next  morning  they  sent  Schiller 
a  fragrant  bunch  of  flowers,  with  a  note,  telling  him 
that  they  were  to  leave  home  on  the  morrow.  He  wept 
at  the  bitter  news,  but  could  not  bring  himself  to  see 
them  once  again.  So  he  wrote  his  adieux  and  his 
thanks  for  their  kindness.  Lotte  replied  that  evening 
to  his  letter,  adding  next  day  affectionate  words  of 
farewell,  and  the  hope  of  speedy  meeting.  She  sent 
him  also  a  geranium  which  she  herself  had  tended. 
Then  he  wrote  again  thus :  "  I  would  fain  see  vou  once 
more  to-day,  were  it  only  from  afar  and  for  a  moment. 
The  preparations  for  the  journey  stupefy  me ;  I  shall 
not  come  to  myself  until  I  am  on  the  road.  .  .  .  The 
prospect  of  our  reunion  stands  clear  and  fair  before 
me.  Everything  shall  and  will  lead  me  back  to  that. 
.  .  .  Yes,  dearest  ones,  you  are  part  of  my  soul,  and  I 
shall  never  lose  you.  ..." 

Yet,  though  he  felt  such  inseparable  attachment  to 
Lotte,  he  could  not  muster  courage  sufficient  to  declare 
this  to  her ;  indeed  he  hardly  dared  hope  to  possess 
her,  when  in  such  straits  himself,  and  when  help 
seemed  so  far  away. 


CHAPTER  III. 

FROM  NOVEMBER,  1788,  TO  MAY,  1789. 

Upon  his  return  from  Rudolstadt,  Schiller  fell  a 
prey  to  gloomy  reflections;  he  firmly  determined  to 
shun  society,  and  to  use  all  time  and  energy  toward 
bettering  his  life,  toward  changing  his  position  in  the 
world.  He  first  made  arrangements  with  Wieland 
about  the  Mercur,  and  the  proposed  issue  of  that  jour- 
nal in  altered  form  was  again  discussed ;  Schiller 
should  receive  one  hundred  Carolines  for  supplying 
twenty -four  sheets  of  matter  to  it  per  annum ;  pay- 
ment was  also  to  be  derived  from  articles  he  had 
already  furnished.  Then  lie  was  to  join  other  writers 
in  the  issue  of  a  series  of  select  memoirs,  and  this  was 
work  both  easy  and  remunerative.  The  Thalia  should 
be  pushed  forward  with  all  speed.  Left  thus  alone, 
with  the  sad  remembrance  of  his  Rudolstadt  friends 
now  parted  from  him,  it  was  easier  to  lead  a  life  of 
seclusion-  "  There  is  much  still  enjoyment  in  this 
existence,"  he  tells  Korner.  "  Specially  I  hke  the 
evenings  which  once  I  used  sinfully  to  waste  in  soci- 
ety. Now  I  sit  over  my  tea  and  a  pipe,  and  one  can 
think  and  work  splendidly."  Probably  it  was  Korner 
who  had  taught  him  to  smoke.  Schiller,  however,  had 
not  confided  to  his  friend  the  story  of  his  love,  but 
gave  out  that  he  was  heart-whole.  It  is  true  that  he 
had  not,  as  in  Dresden,  blindly  abandoned  himself  to 
his  passion ;  he  had  not  compromised  himself  in  any 
way,  but  his  whole  heart  was  now  Lotte's  ;  she  alone 

256 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  257 

could  bring  him  happiness ;  and  for  her  sister,  too,  he 
had  deep  regard.  Lotte  confessed  to  him  that  no 
one  had  ever  touched  her  inmost  sympathies  as  he  had 
done ;  his  tender  words  of  comfort  to  her  when  in  dis- 
tress had  moved  her  to  tears,  it  seemed  a  necessity  in 
her  hfe  to  look  forward  to  days  of  coming  happiness 
spent  together  with  him.  A  nobler  attachment,  this, 
than  Frau  von  Kalb's  professed  affection,  who  only 
selfislily  aimed  at  keeping  him  close  to  her  side. 
Schiller  had  been  to  see  her,  but  did  not  find  her 
alone ;  at  his  second  visit,  she  seemed  in  good  health 
and  spirits.  They  came  to  no  explanation ;  still  less 
did  any  passionate  correspondence  pass  between  them. 
Charlotte  felt  certain  of  his  intimacy  with  the  Lengen- 
felds,  and  she  now  treated  him  with  indifference,  trying 
to  seem  gay  and  vivacious,  and  giving  a  ball  at  which 
she  herself  danced  and  sang.  Schiller  also  went  once 
to  Frau  von  Stein's,  for  whom  he  felt  real  attachment, 
particularly  as  she  was  the  warm  friend  of  Lotte  and 
Caroline. 

Correspondence  with  the  two  sisters  formed  his  chief 
delight.  On  the  evening  of  22d  November,  Lotte's 
birthday,  he  wrote  to  tell  her  how  agreeably  he  had 
spent  it.  "  Since  I  came  back  here  I  had  been  har- 
assed, crushed  down  by  work  for  which  I  lacked  thor- 
ough sympathy,  and  this  was  the  first  day  that  my 
faculties  seemed  to  have  got  life  again.  I  gave  myself 
up  to  sweet,  poetic  reveries ;  all  the  glow  of  fancy  was 
relit  within  me.  And  for  this  pleasure  let  me  thank 
you.  You  are  the  saint  of  this  day,  and  my  delight  is 
great  at  having  so  precious  a  source  of  inspiration." 
He  continues  to  tell  the  friends  of  all  that  happens  to 
him.  He  calms  their  anxiety  as  to  liis  health  with 
the  assurance  that  he  got  benefit  from  fresh  air  and 
exercise,  and  that  he  felt  really  well ;  Bertuch,  too, 
showed  him  "  much  careful  sympathy,"  he  said.  Be- 
sides the  "  Iphigeueia,"  he  had  begun  to  translate  the 


258  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

"  Phoenicians "    of   Euripides,  and   was    also    working, 
though  with  little  interest,  at  "  The  Ghostseer." 

During  the  unusually  cold  weather  of  that  Decem- 
ber he  never  left  the  house.  It  was  pleasant  for  him 
to  be  visited  by  Schubart  the  younger  and  also  by 
Moritz,  who  on  his  return  from  Rome  was  staying  with 
Goethe.  The  former,  who  was  travelling  from  Berlin 
to  Mainz,  told  Schiller  of  the  great  effect  produced  by 
"  Don  Carlos "  at  the  Berlin  National  Theatre ;  for 
Engel  and  Eamler,  in  spite  of  their  opposition,  had 
been  obliged  by  royal  command  to  put  the  play  in 
rehearsal.  The  scene  between  Philip  and  Posa  had 
made  a  deep  impression  upon  his  Majesty.  Schiller 
felt  thoroughly  happy  at  being  thus  busily  employed. 
After  the  translation  from  Euripides,  he  meant  to  go 
on  to  ^schylus's  "  Agamemnon,"  a  real  lonne  louche 
for  him,  he  said.  And  in  a  year  his  style  would  show 
the  rich  benefit  it  had  gained  from  his  study  of  the 
Greeks.  He  still  thought  of  continuing  "  The  Ghost- 
seer," and  of  making  addition  to  the  "  Philosophic  Let- 
ters ; "  "  The  Artists,"  another  work,  was  also  unfinished. 

In  the  meanwhile,  at  Weimar,  his  "  Revolt  of  the 
Netherlands"  had  created  much  stir.  Voigt,  who  had 
always  felt  interest  in  Schiller,  hereupon  thought  of 
calling  him  to  Jena,  in  the  room  of  Professor  Eich- 
horn,  who  was  gone  to  Gottingen.  Goethe  quite 
agreed  to  the  plan,  asking  Voigt  to  inquire  whether 
the  poet  were  willing  to  accept  a  supernumerary  pro- 
fessorship, which  for  the  first  might  be  without  emolu- 
ment. Voigt's  kind  words  of  persuasion  led  Schiller 
to  comply.  On  80tli  November  Goethe  had  gone 
with  the  duke  to  Gotha,  and  A^'oigt  at  once  informed 
him  of  the  result  of  his  inquiry.  He  asked  him  to 
mention  the  matter  to  the  Dukes  of  Gotha  and  Weimar, 
and  to  Minister  von  Frankenberg.  These  gave  willing 
consent,  and  Karl  August  instructed  Goethe  to  lay  tliie 
matter  before  tlie  Privy  Council  without  delay,  which 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  259 

he  accordingly  did  upon  his  return  on  7th  December. 
The  pro  memoria  submitted  to  the  Council  ran  thus : 
"  Herr  Friedrich  Schiller,  upon  whom  some  years 
ago  his  Serene  Highness  conferred  the  title  of  council- 
lor, and  who  for  some  time  past  has  resided  in  the 
neighbourhood,  has  won  a  name  for  himself  by  his 
writings,  and  especially  of  late,  by  a  history  of  the 
revolt  of  the  Netherlands  under  Spanish  rule,  has 
given  promise  of  success  as  a  historian.  ...  By  those 
who  know  him,  he  is  described  as  being  of  excellent 
character ;  his  conduct  is  serious  and  his  manners 
pleasing,  so  that  one  may  trust  him  to  exercise  great 
influence  upon  the  young.  .  .  .  He  would  seek  to 
master  the  subject  of  history,  and  in  this  field  to  be 
helpful  to  the  academy." 

Two  days  later  the  official  letter  of  appointment  was 
sent  round  for  confirmation  to  the  Dukes  of  Gotha, 
Coburg,  Meiningen,  and  Hildburghausen.  On  the  12th 
Schiller  made  his  long-postponed  visit  to  Goethe,  who, 
alluding  to  the  Jena  appointment,  calmed  the  poet's 
fear  as  to  thorough  qualification  for  the  post  by  the 
trite  remark  that,  in  teaching,  one  learns ;  and  he  ex- 
pressed his  conviction  that  Schiller  would  bring  benefit 
to  the  academy  and  to  himself.  By  the  15th  already, 
Goethe,  whose  sympathy  was  most  grateful  to  him, 
forwarded  Schiller  the  official  note  he  had  received 
from  the  government,  bidding  him  make  ready  for 
removal  to  Jena,  as  his  appointment  was  as  good  as 
decided  upon. 

The  suddenness  of  such  reply  threw  him  into  great 
perplexity,  for  it  lessened  all  hope  of  a  speedy  dis- 
charge of  his  debts.  He  wrote  in  his  excited  way  to 
Korner  on  the  15th,  complaining  that  Voigt  had  "  taken 
him  in."  "  I  am  in  fearful  straits,"  he  said,  "  as,  owing 
to  the  many,  many  works  which  for  pecuniary  reasons 
must  positively  be  finished  this  winter,  I  can  but  make 
hasty  preparation.     Then  again,  my  position  as  profes- 


26o  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

sor  will  entail  various  fresh  expenses,  not  counting  the 
cost  of  a  lecture-room,  etc.  I  must  also  take  my  de- 
gree as  magister  philosojjhicc,  a  thing  not  to  be  done 
without  money ;  and  this  year  I  can  least  of  all  spare 
the  necessary  time  for  study.  Certainly,  after  this 
gloomy  period  my  future  will  be  a  brighter  one,  for 
now  at  last  my  lot  seems  fixed."  It  also  grieved  him 
at  heart  that  this  professorship  would  hinder  his  long- 
wished-for  stay  at  Kudolstadt  during  the  summer ;  yet 
he  might  count  it  a  piece  of  fortune  to  be  still  so  near 
that  beloved  place,  nay,  he  might  now  look  to  realise 
his  fondest  wish,  to  wed  his  beloved.  First  of  all  he 
must  continue  "  The  Ghostseer,"  so  as  to  complete  the 
sixth  number  of  Tlialia ;  there  were  to  be  two  more 
instalments  of  this,  which  should  appear  in  rapid  suc- 
cession, as  he  was  in  sore  need  of  money.  When  at 
his  wits'  end,  with  only  pence  sufficient  to  pay  the 
postage  of  his  manuscript,  he  was  overjoyed  at  receiv- 
ing a  sum  due  to  him  from  the  Literatur  Zeitung, 
money  that  he  had  not  expected.  Seven  years  later 
he  has  vivid  recollection  of  the  "  glad  surprise "  this 
caused  him. 

It  was  on  the  night  of  the  2 2d,  having  returned  from 
a  supper,  that  he  sat  down  to  write  the  news  of  his 
appointment  to  the  Lengenfelds.  His  fondest  wish,  he 
said,  was  that  in  that  summer  they  might  break  in 
upon  him  as  some  "  heavenly  vision."  How  gladden- 
ing to  him  the  prospect  of  seeing  them  often,  now ! 

He  made  little  of  the  fact  that  the  appointment  was 
an  unsalaried  one.  To  accept  such  a  beggarly  pittance 
as  that  offered  to  Reinhold  would  have  been  degrading 
rather  than  a  help  to  him.  "  My  whole  object  in  this 
affair  is  to  step  into  a  position  that  is  honourable,  and 
which  will  give  me  the  connections  of  a  citizen,  so  that 
through  these  I  may  find  other  and  better  employ." 
This  he  wrote  to  Korner,  who  considered  that  he 
should  secure  a  good  salary.     "  Jena,  of  all  places  I 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  261 

know,  is,  to  my  mind,  the  only  fitting  one.  With  four 
hundred  thalers  I  can  easily  live ;  for  a  year  I  shall  be 
pressed  into  academical  work,  and  in  a  way  it  gives  me 
a  learned  name,  which  is  needful  to  me  in  order  to  be 
sought  after."  So  nominal  a  stipend  would  only  have 
laid  him  under  an  obligation,  just  as  would  an  ad- 
vance of  two  or  three  hundred  thalers  which,  through 
Goethe,  he  could  easily  have  secured.  How  overjoyed 
were  his  parents  to  hear  of  their  sou's  appointment,  and 
what  esteem  it  won  for  him  in  Wiirtemberg !  Even 
the  duke  was  flattered  that  a  pupil  of  his  had  reached 
such  a  noteworthy  post.  But  Schiller  must  now  pre- 
pare himself  for  that  post.  Thus,  during  the  last  days 
of  the  year  he  sank  himself  into  deep  study  of  the 
works  of  Schmidt  and  Piitter,  and  looked  foward  to 
getting  thorough  knowledge  of  the  sources  of  German 
history. 

It  was  a  great  relief  to  him  when  Bertuch,  on  New 
Year's  Day,  1789,  promised  to  find  him  a  publisher  for 
his  memoirs,  who,  if  he  put  his  name  on  the  title-page, 
furnishing  each  volume  with  a  separate  essay,  would 
pay  him  at  the  rate  of  a  carohne  for  every  sheet.  In 
this  way  he  could  earn  a  livelihood  by  three  hours' 
work  in  the  day,  while  nine  more  gave  him  ample  time 
wherein  to  study  history  and  to  prepare  his  lecture. 
In  two  years  he  hoped  to  be  earning  an  income  suffi- 
cient for  his  needs,  sufiicient,  moreover,  to  help  him  to 
pay  oft'  the  debts  that  embittered  his  life,  and  formed 
a  bar  to  quiet  literary  work.  Lotte  sought  to  smooth 
over  the  difficulties  of  his  new  calhng,  though  it 
pained  her  to  hear  him  speak  of  taking  a  post  in  some 
other  univer.sity  afterward ;  she  liked  to  beheve  such 
plans  lay  buried  in  the  future.  Just  at  this  momen- 
tous time  in  his  life  he  saw  nothing  of  Frau  von  Kalb. 
"The  circle  to  which  she  belongs  is  not  mine,"  he 
writes,  "  and  traces  of  her  influence  on  my  thoughts 
and  feehngs  are  absent." 


262  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

While  busily  wading  through  many  a  dry  volume  of 
history,  he  continued  to  work  at  "  The  Ghostseer,"  in 
which  he  finally  grew  interested,  as  he  had  to  make 
the  prince  in  it  a  pronounced  freethinker  before  his 
conversion  to  the  Romish  Church.  Then  changes 
must  be  made  in  "  The  Artists ; "  and  he  felt  strong 
inclination  to  begin  upon  a  new  drama,  perhaps  "  The 
Hostile  Brothers."  He  was  very  glad  that  Bertuch 
had  arranged  so  successfully  with  Mauke  for  the  pub- 
hcation  of  the  memoirs,  so  that  by  them  alone  he 
could  earn  a  hving.  There  were  several  expenses,  how- 
ever, in  connection  with  his  new  office  which  he  must 
necessarily  meet.  The  extreme  cold  during  that  Jan- 
uary had  obhged  him  to  keep  his  room  for  a  fortnight. 
Upon  regaining  health,  he  felt  his  mental  energies  braced 
and  strengthened  for  his  new  work,  though  he  still 
resfretted  having  made  sacrifice  of  time  and  freedom 
merely  for  the  sake  of  his  prospect,  and  without  the 
shghtest  pecuniary  gain.  Depression  did  not  hinder 
him,  however,  from  attending  the  public  ball  given  on 
3d  January,  where,  as  he  jestingly  said,  he  should  find 
an  ideal  for  the  lovely  Greek  in  his  "  Ghostseer,"  who 
must  be  no  less  an  arch-deceiver.  In  his  conception 
of  this  bewitching  character,  he  had  before  all  others 
Henriette's  portrait  in  his  mind ;  yet  to  him  she  was 
far  from  being  a  jilt  —  nay,  she  was  of  all  persons  the 
very  last  to  convert  him  to  her  Catholic  faith.  He 
well  remembered  last  year's  masquerade,  where  he  had 
so  unexpectedly  met  Lotte.  Next  evening  for  the 
first  time  in  nine  months  he  went  to  the  theatre, 
where  the  unnaturalness  of  opera  gi-eatly  impressed 
him.  He  was  glad  to  hear  that  in  May  Beulwitz  was 
to  travel  with  the  prince,  and  that  then,  in  the  summer, 
the  sisters  would  have  greater  liberty ;  Lotte  even 
dreamed  of  meeting  Schiller  and  Korner  at  the  baths 
of  Lauchstadt. 

On  1st  February  Moritz  continued  his  journey  with 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  263 

the  duke.  Scliiller  had  found  his  society  "  droll  and 
interesting."  He  deemed  him  a  noble-minded  man,  a 
deep  thinker,  with  full  sense  of  what  is  beautiful  in 
life,  despite  his  idolatry  of  Goethe,  his  contempt  for 
all  poetry  not  perfect  in  finish,  and  his  fervid  dishke 
of  Schiller's  "  Plot  and  Passion."  Moritz  had  merci- 
lessly bantered  such  of  the  Weimar  ladies  as  professed 
themselves  touched  by  this  play.  But  he  gave  warm 
praise  to  the  "  Revolt  of  the  Netherlands,"  and  Schiller 
and  he  found  much  for  mutual  sympathy. 

On  the  3d  (Caroline's  birthday,  as  he  afterward  joy- 
fully learnt),  perhaps  spurred  thereto  by  Moritz,  he  at 
last  completed  his  "  Artists,"  which  he  held  to  be  the 
most  finished  piece  of  work  that  he  had  yet  done.  He 
sent  it  to  Wieland  for  the  Mercur,  by  whose  helpful  crit- 
icism he  hoped  greatly  to  profit.  With  a  view  to  con- 
tinuing "  The  Ghostseer,"  he  also  asked  Wieland  for  a 
few  volumes  of  the  "  Bibliotheque  de  la  Campagne." 

While  giving  to  the  world  in  this  new  poem  his  con- 
ception of  an  ideal  artist,  he  grew  filled  with  bitter 
resentment  against  Goethe.  As  minister,  Goethe  had 
shown  himself  friendly,  and  as  poet,  Schiller  expected 
their  relations  to  become  closer  also,  —  a  thing  impos- 
sible then,  both  by  reason  of  their  widely  opposed 
natures,  as  by  the  thorough  difference  of  their  train- 
ing. Goethe  had  sufficient  to  engross  and  to  content 
him  in  his  intimacy  with  Frau  von  Stein  and  Christiane 
Vulpius,  and  also  in  his  deep  attachment  to  Moritz, 
about  whom  there  yet  lingered  something  more  than 
a  breath  of  that  Italy  for  which  he  so  passionately 
longed.  Though  Schiller  very  rarely  saw  him,  and 
could  only  go  by  the  sayings  of  other  ladies,  stung  to 
jealousy  by  the  poet's  preference  for  Frau  von  Stein, 
he  took  him  to  be  a  man  who  sought  his  ideal  of  hap- 
piness in  consummate  egoism  and  self-love.  Then  it 
rankled  him  that  Goethe  seemed  ever  to  have  been 
fortune's    favourite,    while    anguishing    poverty    had 


264  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

wrecked  his  own  life.  So  there  were  moments  when 
in  his  excitement  he  hated  Goethe  as  a  man,  when 
lie  gave  vent  to  bursts  of  most  passionate  invective 
against  him.  "  I  could  destroy  his  spirit,  and  could 
love  him  again  with  all  my  heart."  Thus  he  once 
writes  to  Korner,  adding,  it  is  true,  in  a  later  letter 
that  his  friend  will  have  detected  his  weakness  in  what 
he  liad  said  about  Goethe.  Then  follows  the  passage  : 
"  This  man,  this  Goethe,  is  in  my  way,  ever  reminding 
me  how  hardly  I  have  been  dealt  with  by  fate.  How 
easily  his  genius  triumphed  over  his  destiny,  and  see, 
how  to  this  moment  /  have  to  fight  on  !  There  is 
now  no  retrieving  all  that  has  been  lost  (after  thirty,  a 
change  of  career  is  impossible) ;  and  I  myself  could 
not  attempt  such  a  change  until  three  or  four  years 
were  over,  for  at  least  four  years  must  be  still  sacri- 
ficed to  Fate.  But  I  am  yet  of  good  courage ;  and  I 
have  faith  in  a  lucky  revolution  hereafter."  "V\Tiile 
Lotte,  who  formed  her  mind  more  and  more  on 
Schiller's,  regretfully  gave  her  judgment  of  Goethe, 
Caroline  spoke  in  defence  of  the  friend  she  honoured, 
who,  as  she  said,  only  seemed  to  be  cold  and  unsympa- 
thetic. But  Schiller  peevishly  rejoined  that  one  had 
too  little  hare  life  to  be  able  to  spend  time  and  pains 
in  deciphering  men  who  were  difficult  to  decipher. 
"  There  is  a  speech  understood  by  all ;  and  it  is  this : 
use  your  powers !  If  each  labours  with  all  his  force, 
he  cannot  rest  hidden  from  others.  This  is  my  plan. 
Once  in  a  position  to  let  all  my  energies  have  play,  he 
and  others  too  will  get  to  know  me,  just  as  now  I 
know  his  spirit."  Caroline  admitted  that  she  had  per- 
haps a  false  picture  of  Goethe,  though  personally  she 
knew  him  more  thoroughly  than  Schiller  did ;  for  his 
genius'  sake,  however,  he  should  be  forgiven  much ; 
and,  she  sagely  remarks,  man  must  forgive  his  fellow 
man,  or  all  social  intercourse  would  cease. 

Schiller  had  a  lively  discussion  with  Korner  about 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  265 

his  gifts  as  a  poet.  All  through  the  winter  he  said  it 
teased  him  to  be  unable  to  make  progress  with  "  The 
Hostile  Brothers,"  the  play  that  he  had  begun  in 
Rudolstadt.  Yet  though  it  was  irksome  to  have  to 
busy  himself  for  years,  maybe,  with  things  so  far  dis- 
tant from  the  goal  of  his  abilities  and  his  leanings,  he 
was  yet  convinced  that  this  would  have  happy  influ- 
ence upon  his  first  dramatic  work,  and  that,  despite  all 
alien  checks  and  hindrances,  his  talent  would  find  and 
fix  its  rightful  bent.  Korner  had  pointed  to  lyric 
verse  as  a  field  in  which  he  excelled,  being  alone ; 
whereas,  in  drama,  Goethe  proved  a  dangerous  rival ; 
but  Schiller  was  so  little  of  this  opinion  that  he 
deemed  lyric-writing  the  most  petty,  the  most  thank- 
less of  arts,  a  land  of  bondage  rather  than  a  newly 
won  province.  He  meant  to  make  fresh  essays  in 
drama ;  for  though  of  course  he  could  in  no  way  meas- 
ure himself  with  Goethe  at  his  strongest  and  his  best, 
though  in  the  natural  drama  he  stood  behind  him  and 
many  an  earlier  poet,  yet  Schiller  believed  that  he  had 
originated  a  special  school  of  drama  in  which  he  would 
excel,  just  because  it  was  of  his  own  making.  Korner 
would  not  have  it  said  that  Goethe  was  the  greater 
genius ;  in  certain  branches,  perhaps,  he  possessed  finer 
skill,  a  skill  that  Schiller  could  gain  with  time.  Be- 
fore this  he  had  proposed  as  subject  an  epic  upon 
Frederick  the  Great,  and  as  model  the  Horatian  ode ; 
now,  Korner  suggested  high  comedy.  Schiller  was 
irritated  at  such  hints,  and  most  at  this,  that  Korner, 
while  thoroughly  admiring  "  The  Artists,"  denied  it 
rank  as  a  poem. 

"  If,"  says  Schiller,  "  if  within  a  year  you  could  get  me 
a  wife  with  twelve  thousand  thalers,  a  wife  with  whom 
I  could  live,  to  whom  I  could  cleave,  in  five  years  I'd 
write  you  a  Fridericade,  a  classic  tragedy,  and,  as  you 
are  so  set  upon  them,  half  a  dozen  fine  odes  into  the 
bargain."     Alas  !  his  debts  and  the  load  of  work  which 


266  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

must  be  finished  were  a  yoke  that  still  crushed  him 
down.  He  still  longed  with  all  his  heart  for  Eudol- 
stadt,  and  for  the  friends  he  had  left  there.  The  close 
intimacy  with  Frau  von  Kalb  had  dwindled  to  easy 
familiarity ;  she  went  her  own  way  now.  He  heard 
from  Rudolstadt  that  Frau  von  Lengenfeld  had  accepted 
the  offer  of  instructress  to  the  two  little  daughters  of 
the  hereditary  prince.  On  the  10th  of  March,  already 
she  went  to  live  at  the  castle.  Five  days  later  Schiller 
rode  over  to  Eudolstadt,  and  his  presence  gave  great 
delight  to  the  sisters.  He  could  make  no  stay,  but 
travelled  on  to  Jena,  where  he  had  to  get  settled  in 
his  new  home.  Among  the  lecture-notices  he  adver- 
tised his  own  lectures,  to  be  given  twice  weekly,  an 
"  Introduction  to  Universal  History,"  Schiitz  having 
discouraged  the  plan  of  lecturing  privately  upon  the 
Revolt  of  the  Netherlands.  Schiitz,  Hiifelaud,  and 
Reinhold  were  very  helpful  in  smoothing  the  diffi- 
culties of  his  new  position.  He  took  lodgings  with  the 
sisters  Schramm,  at  the  corner  of  the  market-place, 
and  dined  with  Schiitz,  whose  coquettish  wife  "  besieged 
him  with  attentions."  He  joined  the  Professors'  Club, 
which  counted  a  few  students  among  its  members. 
"  One  pays  eight  thalers  every  half-year,"  he  told 
Korner ;  "  for  which  one  sups  five  and  twenty  times ; 
but  of  course  wine  is  extra."  Though  he  foresaw  little 
enjoyment  from  belonging  to  this  club,  it  was  con- 
venient for  many  reasons  to  have  a  place  for  finishing 
work  which  must  else  be  got  through  at  home.  Jena 
could  yield  him  nothing  in  the  way  of  society,  society 
refined  by  the  presence  of  ladies ;  not  even  at  the 
Griesbachs'  house  could  he  look  for  this. 

Returning  on  the  20th  to  Weimar,  the  study  of 
history  absorbed  all  his  attention,  and  to  this  end  he 
hastened  to  procure  works  by  Beck  and  Abb^  Millot,  a 
translation  of  Gibbon,  Spittler's  "  Church  History  "  and 
Herder's  "  Ideas."     Bossuet,  Robertson,  and  Schroeckh 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  267 

would  also  serve  him  in  the  preparation  of  nis  lecture. 
He  had  finished  the  eighth  number  of  the  Thalia,  which, 
besides  his  translation  of  the  "  Phoenicians,"  contained  an 
exciting  passage  from  the  second  volume  of  "  The  Ghost- 
seer  "  and  a  description  of  Egmout's  "  Life  and  Death." 

His  heavy  debt  to  Beit,  the  money-lender,  forced  him 
to  offer  Crusius  a  collection  in  three  volumes  of  miscel- 
laneous essays,  for  which  he  should  receive  the  fee  of  a 
Caroline  the  sheet.  The  manuscript  should  be  dehvered 
at  once,  but  set  up  in  type  a  year  later,  after  fresh  re- 
vision. To  Schiller's  delight  the  publisher  consented, 
the  terms  being  that  two  hundred  thalers  should  be 
paid  at  Michaelmas  and  twenty-four  carohnes  at  the 
following  Easter,  though  a  year's  interest  must  be 
deducted  from  this  sum.  It  was  galling  to  be  obliged 
to  pay  fifty  thalers  to  the  faculty  for  the  degree  of 
Doctor  Philosophim.  Otherwise  Schiller  had  good  hopes 
of  success ;  if  only  a  fifth  of  the  nine  hundred  students 
formed  his  audience,  and  if  but  the  half  of  that  audi- 
ence paid  fees,  he  would  receive  annually  a  hundred 
louis  d'or ;  he  had  no  rival  lecturer  to  fear,  and  his 
subject  was  a  subject  of  interest  to  all.  It  was  true 
that  at  first  his  lectures  were  to  be  given  gratis,  but, 
through  the  summer,  his  "Memoirs"  would  support  him. 
In  August  he  hoped  to  meet  Korner  at  Leipzig,  or  per- 
haps in  Jena  too ;  he  even  thought  of  taking  him  to 
Kudolstadt,  to  be  introduced  to  the  Lengenfelds. 

Toward  the  close  of  April  he  became  acquainted 
with  Burger  the  poet,  who,  by  the  injustice  of  party 
faction,  had  still  been  debarred  from  a  professorship. 
Burger's  poems  were  just  published  in  a  second  edition. 
Schiller  found  this  simple  man  "  a  straightforward,  noble 
fellow  ; "  his  nationahty,  certainly,  disappeared  on  know- 
ing him,  a  nationality  that  in  his  poetry  was  pushed  to 
dulness ;  the  springtime  of  his  genius  was  past  now. 
Schiller  talked  with  him  of  the  poem  "  The  Gods  of 
Greece,"  and  of  its  ignorant  critics,  and  he  praised  the 


268  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

translation  of  the  "  Iphigeneia."  They  planned  to  trans- 
late a  piece  of  the  "  iEneid  "  in  a  metre  that  each  should 
fix.  Schiller  also  got  to  know  Reichardt  the  musician, 
whose  overbearing,  arrogant  manner  greatly  repelled 
him.  Like  many  more  in  Weimar,  he  felt  most  of- 
fended that  Goethe  should  live  with  such  a  man  and 
give  him  his  confidence  just  because  he  had  written  the 
music  for  his  "  Claudine."  The  Weimar  ladies  at  this 
time  had  httle  good  to  say  of  Goethe,  owing  to  the 
rupture  with  Frau  von  Stein.  Schiller  parted  in  all 
friendship  with  Wielaud,  promising  to  send  to  the  Neuc 
Mercur  of  1790  a  yearly  contribution  of  twelve  sheets 
of  letterpress,  the  matter  to  be  mostly  historical. 

His  emigration  to  Jena  was  delayed.  He  felt  glad 
to  go;  at  Jena  he  was  nearer  to  Rudolstadt,  and  he 
looked  forward  to  a  new  life  full  of  promise  for  the 
future.  Two  years  ago  Charlotte,  she  whom  he  thought 
of  introducing  to  the  Dresden  circle,  had  drawn  him  to 
Weimar ;  now,  she  and  he  were  estranged,  and,  with 
Lotte  and  Carohne  as  his  friends,  a  new,  happier, 
brighter  life  lay  spread  before  him.  In  that  past  time 
he  had  hoped  for  some  mark,  however  slight,  of  the 
duke's  favour.  Now,  by  his  writings,  by  his  talent,  he 
had  reached  a  professor's  post ;  one  which  for  the  first 
brought  him  no  money,  it  is  true,  but  he  had  touched  a 
point  whence  he  could  advance  to  larger  things  and 
could  make  himself  needful  to  the  leading  German 
colleges.  Fate's  rude  hand,  alas !  was  to  crush  his 
fondest  hopes  but  all  too  early. 


Book  VIII. 

The  Professorship 


CHAPTEE   I. 

FROM    MAY,    1789,    TO    FEBRUARY,    1790. 

On  May  the  11th  Schiller  moved  into  his  lodgings 
at  Jena,  and  they  proved  far  more  comfortable  ones 
than  he  had  expected.  "  To  look  on  such  pleasant 
surroundings,"  he  tells  Korner,  "  makes  my  life  very 
agreeable.  There  are  three  rooms  adjoining  each  other, 
fairly  high  up,  with  light-coloured  carpeting,  many 
windows,  and  everything  either  new  or  in  good  preser- 
vation. I  am  amply  and  handsomely  supplied  with 
furniture ;  two  sofas,  a  card-table,  three  chests  of 
drawers,  and  a  dozen  and  a  half  of  chairs  covered  with 
red  plush.  I  have  had  my  writing-desk  made  for  me, 
which  cost  two  Carolines ;  in  Dresden  you  would  have 
had  to  pay  three  for  it.  This  is  what  I've  long  been 
trying  for,  as  a  writing-table  is,  to  me,  the  most  impor- 
tant piece  of  furniture,  by  which  I  have  always  had  to 
help  myself.  Another  advantage  of  my  lodging  is  the 
flooring,  which  is  pohshed,  clean,  and  spacious.  ...  I 
have,  as  landladies,  two  old  maids,  very  willing  workers, 
and  very  zealous  talkers  to  boot.  They  serve  my  meals 
in  my  room,  —  dinner  costing  two  groschen,  for  which 
I  get  the  same  that  in  Weimar  used  to  cost  four  gro- 
schen." As  he  hardly  had  need  of  more  than  450 
thalers,  a  sum  that  the  "  Memoirs  "  would  bring  him 
in,  he  intended  to  use  any  additional  earnings  in  pay- 
ing off  his  debts  and  in  setting  himself  straight.  For 
the  "Memoirs"  he  thought  of  translating  the  French 
version   of  Princess  Anna   Comnena's  "  Alexias,"   and 

271 


272  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Otto  von  Freising's  history  (in  Latin)  of  Frederick  the 
First.  He  would  also  prepare  an  historical  treatise 
upon  the  Crusades. 

It  was  pleasurable  to  him  now  to  feel  that  he  formed 
part  of  a  distinguished  body,  and  that  from  his  present 
position  he  could  step  to  one  higher  in  honour  and  in 
gains,  which  would  allow  him  to  ask  Lotte  for  her 
hand.  He  soon  got  used  to  life  at  Jena,  though  cer- 
tainly not  without  some  "  sinful "  waste  of  time.  A 
public  ball  showed  him  the  grace  and  beauty  of  the 
Jena  ladies,  but  they  impressed  him  so  little  that  he 
spent  his  evening  at  the  card-table.  A  cleric's  daugh- 
ter, the  prettiest  of  them  all,  was  at  the  same  time  the 
emptiest  and  most  soulless ;  in  point  of  character, 
Dorette  Seidler  pleased  him  best,  the  daughter  of  a 
late  Weimar  councillor.  To  Schiller  the  prospect  of 
associating  with  so  many  scientific  and  literary  men 
was  most  agreeable,  though  he  shrank  from  the  per- 
vading spirit  of  jealousy  and  clique  which  is  never 
absent  from  such  circles. 

There  was  so  much  to  distract  him,  that  the  begin- 
ning of  the  lecture-season  almost  took  him  by  surprise. 
By  his  "  Introduction  to  Universal  History,"  a  course 
of  addresses  to  be  delivered  on  Wednesday  and  Thurs- 
day evenings  at  six  o'clock,  he  meant  to  review  the 
historical  development  of  mankind,  and  in  doing  this 
he  had  not  clearly  determined  down  to  what  epoch  he 
should  carry  such  revision.  The  first  lecture  upon  the 
difference  between  the  philosopher's  mind  and  the 
pedant's  showed  his  standpoint  to  be  opposed  to  that 
of  a  mere  specialist.  May  26th  was  the  date  fixed  for 
his  opening  address.  He  had  chosen  Reinhold's  lecture- 
hall,  which  held  about  a  hundred  people.  Of  course 
the  students  might  be  expected  to  come  in  a  body  to 
hear  the  author  of  their  favourite  play,  "  The  Eobbers," 
lecture  upon  history,  yet  to  choose  a  larger  hall  would 
have  looked  like  presumption. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  273 

"  By  half-past  five  the  auditorium  was  full,"  wrote 
Schiller  to  his  friend ;  "  from  Keinhold's  window  I  saw 
troop  after  troop  coming  up  the  street,  as  if  they  would 
never  end.  Though  not  wholly  free  from  nervousness, 
I  was  pleased  to  see  the  growing  numbers,  and  it  rather 
strengthened  my  courage.  I  had  indeed  steeled  my- 
self into  a  certain  firmness,  not  a  little  helped  in  this 
by  the  thought  that  my  lecture  need  shun  no  compari- 
son with  any  other  delivered  in  Jena,  and,  above  all, 
by  the  consciousness  that  all  my  hearers  would  avow 
my  superiority.  But  when  the  throng  grew  ever 
greater,  so  that  hall  and  stairs  were  crammed,  and 
many  turned  back  from  the  door,  some  one  near  me 
suggested  that  for  this  lecture  I  should  make  use  of 
another  hall.  Griesbach's  brother-in-law  (Schiitz  of 
Biickeburg)  happened  to  be  among  the  students,  so  I 
let  the  proposal  be  made  to  them  that  I  should  lecture 
at  Griesbach's,  and  they  joyfully  accepted  it.  Then 
there  was  a  droll  scene.  Everybody  rushed  out,  helter- 
skelter,  down  the  street,  and  the  Johannisstrasse,  one 
of  the  largest  in  Jena,  was  quite  filled  with  students. 
As  they  thus  ran,  with  might  and  main,  to  get  a  good 
place  in  Griesbach's  lecture-hall,  there  was  alarm  in 
all  the  street,  and  bustling  at  every  window.  At  first 
people  thought  it  was  a  fire,  and  the  castle-guard  shared 
in  the  common  stir.  '  What  is  it  ? '  '  What's  the  mat- 
ter ? '  was  asked  by  all.  Then  came  the  cry,  '  The 
new  professor  is  going  to  lecture.'  .  .  .  After  a  little 
while  I  followed  with  Eeinhold ;  passing  down  the 
streets  of  the  town,  I  felt  as  though  I  were  running 
the  gauntlet.  Griesbach's  hall  is  the  largest  one, 
and,  when  filled,  it  can  hold  between  three  or  four 
hundred  people.  This  time  it  was  full,  so  full  that 
an  anteroom  and  the  passage  leading  to  the  front 
entrance  were  both  blocked  up,  while  in  the  auditorium 
many  stood  on  the  side  stairs.  So  I  walked  in  along 
an  avenue  of  spectators  and  listeners,  and  could  hardly 


274  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

find  the  chair,  which  I  took  amid  loud  knocking,  that 
here  counts  for  applause.  .  .  .  Though  the  atmosphere 
of  the  hall  was  close,  in  the  chair  it  was  bearable,  for 
all  the  windows  were  open,  and  I  got  fresh  air.  At 
the  first  ten  words  that  I  could  repeat  in  firm  tone,  I 
had  thorough  control  over  my  countenance ;  and  I  read 
on  with  a  strength  and  a  sureness  of  voice  that  was 
surprising  even  to  myself.  Right  back  at  the  door  I 
could  be  heard  quite  distinctly." 

Though  Schiller  read  and  did  not  recite  his  lecture, 
its  wealth  of  thought,  its  gi-ace  and  vigour  of  language, 
made  most  strong  impression.  That  night  all  Jena 
spoke  of  it.  The  students  serenaded  him,  an  unheard- 
of  honour  to  be  paid  to  a  new  professor,  whose  post 
was,  moreover,  a  supernumerary  one.  Griesbach  gladly 
gave  up  his  hall  for  the  other  lectures.  There  were 
480  persons  at  the  next  one,  and  fifty  more  who  found 
no  place.  Schiller  spoke  somewhat  extempore  on  this 
occasion,  setting  forth  his  conception  of  the  philosophy 
of  history.  His  closing  remark  had  wonderful  effect, 
where  he  told  his  listeners  that  each,  who  to  clearness 
of  mind  joined  tenderness  of  heart,  should  desire  to 
pay  to  posterity  the  debt  he  owed  and  could  not  give 
back  to  a  bygone  generation  for  the  many  precious 
benefits  it  had  bequeathed  him.  Despite  all  applause, 
Schiller  felt  no  thorough  taste  for  lecturing;  he  was 
not  sure  of  his  hearers'  sympathies,  and  he  could  not 
easily  descend  to  bald  simplicity.  He  feared,  too,  that 
his  success  might  make  others  jealous. 

During  the  short  Whitsuntide  holiday,  he  found  no 
time  to  see  those  he  loved  at  liudolstadt.  A  hope  of 
meeting  them  at  Lobeda  proved  vain ;  their  journey 
through  Jena  to  the  baths  of  Lauchstadt  was  also 
delayed,  Korner,  however,  gladdened  him  with  the 
promise  of  meeting  him  at  Leipzig  in  August,  whence 
they  would  travel  in  company  to  Jena  and  "Weimar. 
In  the  second  week  after  Whitsuntide,  Schiller  gave 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  275 

his  third  and  fourth  lecture  upon  man's  primitive  social 
life  as  shown  in  Mosaic  record.  The  crowd  of  listeners 
was  as  great  as  before,  yet  to  maintain  his  hold  of  such 
as  had  hitherto  been  caught  merely  by  the  newness  and 
the  sparkle  of  his  lectures,  he  felt  he  must  make  them 
more  generally  easy  to  understand ;  though  this  would 
cost  him  more  pains,  and  might  result  in  failure.  "  My 
lectures  now  cost  me  an  astonishing  amount  of  time 
and  trouble,"  he  tells  Korner,  "  as  it  behoves  me  first 
to  learn;  and  then,  too,  the  matter  grows  gi^eater 
under  my  hand  —  greater  than  is  needed  for  the  mo- 
ment, though  I  am  loath  to  let  the  thoughts  go  past." 
He  soon  gave  up  the  "  Alexias  "  translation  and  made 
it  over  to  a  student,  probably  to  Berliug,  the  poor 
Swede,  whom  Schiller  helped  to  support.  He  longed 
for  Lotte,  tortured  still  by  doubts  if  she  would  ever 
be  his,  hoping  least  of  all  that  such  joy  could  come  to 
liim  now.  His  state  was  the  more  distressful  that  he 
must  hide  all  his  heartache  from  the  world.  He  even 
led  faithful  Korner  astray,  who,  so  he  feared,  might 
speak  to  others  of  his  secret.  At  length,  on  Friday 
the  19th  he  rode  over  to  Rudolstadt,  where  he  stayed 
until  Sunday,  a  day  longer  than  he  had  intended. 
Many  a  plan  was  here  mooted ;  among  other  things, 
his  visit  to  Lauchstiidt  and  meeting  with  Korner  were 
talked  of.  He  went  back  to  Jena  in  high  spirits.  In 
his  lectures  he  had  now  reached  the  Babel  epoch,  the 
confusion  of  tongues  and  of  peoples. 

The  Lengenfeld  sisters  travelled  to  Jena  on  10th 
July,  where  they  were  to  stop  at  Griesbach's,  and 
Schiller  should  meet  them  outside  the  town,  under  the 
tall  elder-trees  on  the  banks  of  the  Saale.  The  pleasure 
of  their  meeting  was,  alas!  somewhat  marred.  That 
evening  there  was  a  party  at  Griesbach's,  and  Schiller, 
Professor  Paulus  and  his  wife,  were  among  the  guests 
invited.  Unfortunately,  however,  Schiller  was  detained, 
only  arriving  at  the  last  moment.     Lotte  long  remem- 


276  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

bered  how  anxiously  she  had  waited  for  his  coming,  as 
she  paced  restlessly  through  the  rooms;  Paulus  and 
his  wife,  being  Schiller's  compatriots,  she  found  the 
most  endurable.  Next  morning  the  poet  went  with 
his  friends  for  some  part  of  the  way  to  Naumburg. 
Writing  afterward  to  Lotte,  he  says :  "  Your  last  stay 
in  Jena  was  to  me  but  a  dream  —  and  not  all  a  delight- 
ful dream,  for  never  had  I  wished  to  say  so  much  to 
you  as  then,  and  never  did  I  say  less.  What  I  was 
forced  to  keep  in,  weighed  me  down ;  I  got  no  joy 
from  seeing  you.  I  have  so  often  found  this ;  outward 
hindrances  were  not  always  to  blame  for  it.  One  can 
hardly  beheve  that  people,  wholly  at  one  in  sympathies, 
and  who  so  easily,  so  rapidly,  understand  each  other, 
have  yet  so  long  a  road  between  them.  So  near  and 
yet  so  far  ! "  This  showed  plainly  enough  his  cherished 
secret,  and  Caroline,  with  her  characteristic  love  of 
action,  determined  to  put  an  end  to  all  this  bashful 
silence. 

On  her  way  to  Lauchstadt,  to  meet  an  invalid 
friend  at  Burgcirner,  near  Hettstiidt,  she  there  encoun- 
tered Laroche  and  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt,  then  in 
his  three  and  twentieth  year,  Schiller  had  seen  Laroche 
at  Eudolstadt ;  he  and  Humboldt  had  in  that  January 
come  thither  from  Grittingen  to  make  Caroline's  ac- 
quaintance. Caroline  saw  that  her  suffering  friend, 
"  wrapped  in  her  feelings,"  had  liking  for  them  both, 
and,  as  she  told  Schiller,  she  was  resolved  to  "  unravel " 
the  plot.  Her  remark  to  him  that  Humboldt  was 
worth  far  more  than  Laroche  showed  whom  she  pre- 
ferred. Schiller  thought  that  maybe  she  would  also 
undertake  to  "  unravel  "  his  own  love-afi'air. 

On  the  1st  or  2d  of  August,  at  their  pressing  request, 
he  followed  the  sisters  to  Lauchstadt.  They  were 
living  with  their  friend  at  Kiichler's,  a  carpenter  in 
the  Armenhausgasse.  Before  Schiller  started,  on  the 
3d,  to  meet  Kdrner  at  Leipzig,  he  confided  the  secret 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  277 

of  his  love  to  Caroline.  She  listened  kindly,  sympa- 
thisingly,  telling  him  that  Lotte  loved  him  heartily, 
and  was  wholly  his ;  yet  this  should  not  loosen  their 
own  close  bond  of  friendship.  Caroline  the  rather 
hoped  to  hve  with  the  young  couple,  as  she  could  not 
be  parted  from  Lotte,  nor  give  up  the  pleasure  of 
Schiller's  society.  Her  relations  with  her  husband 
were  as  sad  as  ever;  his  roughness  and  caprice  had 
long  embittered  her  life,  and  she  now  determined  at 
aU  hazards  to  get  a  divorce.  Schiller  was  delighted 
at  knowing  that  Lotte  was  his  own,  and  that  he  would 
still  have  Caroline's  helpful  influence.  Not  wishing  to 
see  Lotte  again  before  starting,  he  left  a  note  for  her. 
In  this  he  spoke  of  what  Carohne  had  told  him,  stating 
the  reason  for  such  long  silence,  and  offering  her  all 
that  he  was,  all  that  he  owned. 

"  Is  it  true,  dearest  Lotte ;  dare  I  hope  that  Caroline 
has  read  your  soul,  and  has  given  me  its  answer  —  the 
answer  that  I  dared  not  give  myself?  Tell  me  that 
you  will  be  mine,  and  that  my  happiness  costs  you  no 
sacrifice.  Oh !  make  me  sure  of  that,  and  with  a  single 
word.  Our  hearts  have  long  been  near  to  each  other. 
And  now  let  all  that  is  yet  estranging,  all  that  until 
now  stood  between  us,  fall  away,  that  nothing,  nothing 
trouble  the  free  communion  of  our  souls."  This  was 
the  first  time  that  he  ventured  to  call  her  by  her 
Christian  name. 

On  his  arrival  that  evening  at  Leipzig,  he  had  the 
joy  of  meeting  faithful  Korner,  whom  luckily  he  found 
alone,  and  who  told  him  of  his  intention  to  move 
to  Jena  within  the  year.  And  Schiller  had  news  for 
his  friend  as  well,  which,  in  the  gladness  of  meeting, 
he  could  no  longer  conceal.  It  came  as  a  thorough 
surprise  to  Korner,  yet  this  was  no  time  to  show  the 
enthusiastic  poet  what  actual  imprudence  there  lay  in 
such  a  step.  Schiller  at  once  wrote  to  the  sisters  that 
he  had  told  Korner  his  secret,  and  that  within  a  year 


278  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

he  aud  his  bosom  friend  would  be  living  together  in 
Jeua.  Lotte  and  Caroline  should  choose  Friday,  the 
7th,  for  their  visit  to  Leipzig,  as  on  that  afternoon 
Koruer  was  at  liberty.  "  You  must  see  my  friends," 
he  said,  "  and  I  must  soon  see  you."  They  were  to 
tell  him  in  writing  that  Lotte  would  be  his,  and  that 
he  was  able  to  make  her  happy.  "  I  still  mistrust  a 
hope,  a  joy,  of  which  hitherto  I  have  no  experience; 
let  my  delight  soon  be  wholly  freed  from  this  fear. 
You  cannot  act  as  ordinary  people  act,  so  toward  me 
you  need  only  use  truth,  and  we  can  put  all  formahties 
aside,  and  freely,  plainly,  lay  bare  our  hearts  to  each 
other." 

Lotte  answered  both  his  letters  thus:  "I  have 
twice  begun  writing  to  you,  but  my  feelings  were  each 
time  too  great  to  tind  expression.  Caroline  has  read 
my  soul,  and  has  answered  for  my  heart.  The  thought 
of  adding  to  your  happiness  stands  clear  and  bright 
before  me.  If  deep,  true  love  and  friendship  may  do 
this,  then  my  heart's  fervent  wish  is  gained,  to  see  you 
happy.  —  For  to-day,  no  more ;  on  Friday  we  shall 
meet.  What  delight  to  see  our  Korner,  and  to  let 
you,  love,  read  in  my  heart  how  much  you  are  to  me. 
Here  is  the  letter  I  was  just  going  to  send  you.  Adieu. 
Ever  your  faithful  Lotte."  In  the  letter  enclosed,  of 
the  27th  July,  she  had  written,  "I  should  ever  wish 
you  to  remember  our  friendship,  and  to  have  true  and 
certain  conviction  of  mine,  dear  friend." 

On  the  7th  Lotte  and  Caroline  came  to  Leipzig  with 
Privy  Councillor  von  Barckhausen.  They  were  intro- 
duced to  Korner  and  his  family,  but  the  lovers  had  so 
much  to  say  to  each  other,  that  they  were  left  almost 
entirely  alone,  and  Korner  found  little  opportunity  of 
growing  intimate  with  Lotte.  Next  morning  Schiller 
went  back  with  the  sisters  to  Lauchstadt.  Here  it  was 
agreed  to  keep  the  engagement  secret,  until  Schiller 
should  receive  a  salary,  however  slight,  from  the  duke. 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  279 

He  left  Lauchstadt  on  the  10th,  meeting  Korner  and 
his  family  on  the  road,  wlio  travelled  to  Jena  with 
him,  where  they  stayed  at  his  house.  The  friends  had 
no  chance  for  confidential  talk ;  Schiller  was  wrapped 
up  in  his  newly  found  happiness,  and  Korner  felt  him- 
self in  the  background.  Visits  and  excursions  formed 
another  hindrance.  They  went  to  Weimar,  where 
Korner  called  upon  Privy  Councillor  Voigt,  and  ex- 
plained his  wish  to  enter  the  ducal  service.  Schiller 
also  took  him  to  Frau  von  Kalb,  who  was  then  most 
unhappy  at  hearing  nothing  of  her  husband,  to  whom 
she  had  now  proposed  a  legal  separation.  Schiller  had 
not  lectured  for  a  fortnight,  so,  before  leaving,  Korner 
was  able  to  hear  him  in  his  capacity  of  professor.  On 
the  16th  or  17th  he  attended  the  address  upon  Lycur- 
gus,  where  Schiller  followed  the  lines  laid  down  by 
Nast.  This  lecture  was  the  ninth  of  the  series ;  the 
foregoing  one  had  treated  of  Moses  and  his  mission. 

Korner  left  on  the  18th,  disappointed  at  this  longed- 
for  meeting  with  his  friend,  which,  so  far  from  bringing 
them  closer,  had  rather  estranged  them.  Two  days 
afterward  the  sisters  left  Lauchstadt  and  came  back 
to  Jena,  where  they  once  more  stayed  at  Griesbach's. 
So  Schiller  saw  them  again,  to  his  great  delight,  and 
they  laid  plans  for  the  future,  and  spoke  of  his  pro- 
jected stay  at  Volkstadt  during  the  vacation.  After 
they  were  gone,  he  felt  perpetual  craving  to  be  with 
them  again.  To  him  the  three  weeks  which  still 
parted  them  seemed  Uke  an  eternity.  Preoccupied  as 
he  was,  those  many  startling  events  in  the  world's 
history,  of  which  rumours  came  across  from  Paris,  and 
which  Wolzogen  witnessed  and  described,  made  far 
slighter  impression  upon  him  than  upon  others,  who 
hailed  the  breaking  of  a  new  day,  bringing  with  it 
freedom  to  the  people.  He  thus  answered  one  of 
Caroline's  glowing  letters :  "  Prepare,  noble  being,  to 
find  nothing  in  me  but  the  power  to  excel,  and  the 


28o  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

will  and  the  enthusiasm  to  use  such  power.  I  will 
look  into  your  beautiful  soul,  will  understand  and  give 
response  to  your  tine  sensibilities ;  yet  if  I  be  out 
of  tune,  that  must  neither  sadden  nor  surprise  you. 
Then  believe,  and  firmly,  that  this  strange  influence 
upon  my  mind  has  come  to  it  from  without.  The 
traces  of  such  influence,  working  upon  me  from  youth 
until  now,  my  better  self  could  never  quite  shake  off. 
But  you  trust  in  my  soul,  and  I  build  upon  that  faith. 
With  all  my  shortcomings  (for,  finally,  you  will  get 
to  know  them  all),  that  which  you  once  liked  in 
me,  you  will  always  find.  You  will  love  me  for  my 
affection.  ..." 

Schiller  intended  to  finish  his  course  of  lectures 
about  the  middle  of  September  with  Alexander  the 
Great.  "  I  am  hurrying  along  now  tremendously,"  he 
writes  on  1st  September,  "  and  my  students  are  right 
glad  at  the  rate  we  go ;  whole  centuries  fly  past  us. 
To-morrow  I  shall  have  done  with  Alcibiades,  and 
then  I  go  on  to  Alexander,  with  whom  I  end.  Our 
Plutarch  stands  me  now  in  good  stead,  though  cer- 
tainly I've  now  more  occasion  to  get  irritated  over 
him."  He  revised  the  translation  of  Anna  Comnena's 
work  for  the  "  Memoirs,"  and  sent  it  to  press,  but 
he  could  neither  prepare  an  essay  promised  for  the 
opening  volume,  nor  complete  the  first  part  of  "  The 
Ghostseer."  His  whole  existence,  his  whole  sympa- 
tliies,  were  centred  in  Lotte  and  Caroline;  Korner, 
even,  must  be  content  with  a  short,  hasty  letter.  "  For 
a  time  much  joy  is  taken  from  me,"  he  tells  the  sisters, 
"  so  that  I  cannot  let  my  heart  speak  against  him 
[Korner]  ;  but  how  much  you  make  me  forget ! " 

Already,  on  the  1st  of  September,  he  had  engaged 
his  old  lodgings  at  Volkstadt.  To  prevent  any  feehng 
of  ill-will  or  of  suspicion  on  the  mother's  part  as  to 
his  visit,  he  sent  a  letter  stating  his  resolve  to  the 
sisters,  which  they  should  show  their  parent.     For  our 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  281 

poet  everything  fell  from  sight  in  the  radiant  joy  of 
his  love.  Nature  and  all  her  beauties  had  nothing  for 
him  now  ;  he  seemed  to  think  that  she  charmed  only 
with  that  lent  to  her  by  man.  Even  when  Lotte 
spoke  of  her  heartfelt  satisfaction  at  the  revolution  in 
France,  he  said  not  a  word  in  answer.  For  all  society 
such  as  Jena  offered  he  felt  very  strong  distaste. 

Fran  von  Kalb  and  her  domestic  troubles  now  dis- 
turbed his  happiness.  He  was  thoroughly  glad  that 
she  had  not  come  to  Eudolstadt,  as  intended,  for  her 
presence  would  have  put  restraint  upon  Lotte  and 
himself,  and,  with  her  suspicious  nature,  she  must 
readily  have  guessed  all.  "  She  has  the  justest  claims 
upon  my  friendship,"  he  tells  the  sisters,  "  and  I  must 
admire  her  for  having  kept  pure  and  true  the  first  feel- 
ings of  our  friendship  through  all  the  strange  laby- 
rinths in  which  we  have  rambled  together."  He  was 
on  excellent  terms  with  her  still,  and  he  hoped  these 
might  last  as  long  as  could  be,  especially  as  Charlotte, 
being  then  in  contention  with  her  husband,  had  need 
of  his  advice  and  support.  Frau  von  Kalb  asked 
Schiller  on  the  10th  to  come  to  her  at  Weimar  to  con- 
sult him  as  to  how  she  should  act ;  but  he  could  not 
leave  his  duties.  However,  to  prevent  her  taking 
offence  at  his  stopping  on  at  Volkstadt,  he  invited  her 
to  meet  him  with  Corona  Schroder  in  Jena.  In  her 
present  position  she  felt  bound  to  decline  such  a 
proposal ;  and  he,  in  making  it,  believed  he  had  done 
all  that  could  be  expected  of  him. 

On  the  15th  he  ended  his  course  of  lectures,  but  he 
could  not  start  until  the  18th,  as  the  expected  money 
from  Mauke,  his  publisher,  did  not  arrive  in  time. 
At  Eudolstadt  he  used  to  visit  the  sisters  on  after- 
noons, but  sometimes  in  the  morning,  too,  as  he  gen- 
erally chose  a  time  when  their  mother  was  absent 
at  the  court.  During  his  first  week  he  suffered  acutely 
with  toothache.     In  this  time  he  recast  his  two  open- 


282  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

ing  lectures  for  the  Mercur,  wrote  the  conclusion  to 
the  first  volume  of  "  The  Ghostseer,"  and  prepared  him- 
self for  the  winter  course  of  lectures.  At  Volkstiidt 
he  felt  some  fresh  touch  of  the  old  passion  for  Charlotte 
von  Kalb.  This  is  seen  from'  his  remark  to  Koruer  on 
the  28th,  that  a  strange  matter  about  which  he  dis- 
liked writing  strongly  absorbed  him ;  it  had  reference 
to  Frau  von  Kalb  and  his  new  relationship  to  Lotte. 
Carohne  wrote  a  month  later,  saying  that  she  thanked 
Heaven  that  Charlotte  was  not  going  to  be  his  wife. 
While  at  Eudolstadt  it  had  been  a  trying  task  for  him 
and  for  the  sisters  to  keep  their  mother  in  ignorance  of 
the  secret.  Caroline  grew  seriously  unwell,  and  it  was 
feared  that  she  would  never  completely  recover  health. 
Her  mother  attributed  this  to  her  stay  at  Lauchstiidt, 
whence  Caroline  had  returned  in  a  gi-eatly  agitated 
state.  The  more  she  sufiered,  the  more  Schiller  showed 
for  her  his  tender  care,  so  that  Lotte  sometimes  feared 
that  he  loved  her  less  than  her  sister,  and  that  he 
might  repent  him  of  his  choice.  But  in  his  gay  society 
all  such  fears  were  dispelled.  Caroline  hked  specially 
to  dream  of  all  the  good  fortune  that  the  Koadjutor  of 
the  Kurfiirst  of  Mainz  should  bring  them.  Freiherr 
Karl  Theodor  von  Dalberg,  brother  to  the  director  of 
the  Mannheim  Theatre,  was  then  in  his  forty-fifth  year. 
Governor  of  Erfurt,  and  a  firm  friend  of  the  Dacherb- 
dens,  he  was  known  to  be  an  enthusiastic  patron  of  the 
arts  and  sciences,  and  he  had  spoken  in  high  praise  of 
Schiller's  poetical  gifts.  Lotte  and  Carohne  were  to 
come  to  Weimar  in  the  winter  ;  the  "  great  matter," 
the  breaking  of  the  secret  to  their  mother,  should  rest 
for  the  present.  Schiller  let  himself  be  kept  back  in 
Eudolstadt  until  the  2  2d,  and  this  hindered  him  not  a 
little  in  the  preparation  and  arrangement  of  his  lec- 
tures. Then  there  was  delay  in  the  printing  of  his 
prospectus,  which  was  not  distributed  among  the  stu- 
dents until    the   majority  had  already   subscribed   to 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  283 

other  series.  This  time  he  lectured  six  times  in  the 
week,  five  times  —  from  five  o'clock  to  six  —  upon 
general  history,  from  the  Frankish  monarchy  down  to 
Frederick  II. ;  and  once  —  every  Thursday  from  six 
to  seven  —  on  Eoman  history.  That  the  number  of  his 
hearers  did  not  exceed  thirty  was,  of  course,  grievously 
disappointing,  but  another  cause  for  this,  besides  the 
delay  in  advertising,  was,  that  his  lectures  were  given 
simultaneously  with  others  that  had  to  be  attended. 
His  whole  receipts  amounted  to  sixty  thalers.  Despite 
such  scanty  attendance,  he  would  prepare  his  lectures 
as  carefully  as  if  he  had  a  hundred  hsteners.  At  his 
free  lectures  the  hall  was  "  fairly  full,"  although,  owing 
to  their  subject,  these  could  not  have  such  charm  for 
the  mass  as  those  delivered  during  the  summer.  The 
first  volume  of  the  "Memoirs"  was  printed  at  such 
speed  that  by  the  end  of  October  it  lay  ready  for  pub- 
lication. Still  he  found  neither  time  nor  humour  to 
write  the  promised  essay  for  this. 

This  daily  lecturing,  so  far  from  being  a  strain, 
rather  quickened  his  zeal  for  work.  Yet,  if  aught  else 
took  his  attention,  the  lectures  were  put  aside.  He 
twice  postponed  them  at  the  beginning  of  November 
when  writing  an  "  Historical  Survey  "  of  the  Crusades. 
Composed  when  in  a  happy  moment  of  inspiration, 
this  grew  under  his  pen  to  such  lofty  form  that  he 
believed  never  before  to  have  put  so  much  thought 
in  so  beautiful  a  shape,  never  more  fitly  to  have  joined 
intellect  with  imagination.  But  this  too  remained  un- 
finished, as  he  reserved  its  sequel  for  another  volume. 
He  now  grew  discontented  with  his  position,  in  pro- 
portion as  it  seemed  to  have  brought  him  farther  from, 
instead  of  nearer  to,  her  he  loved.  Writing  on  his 
birthday,  he  exclaims :  "  What  evil  genius  could  have 
prompted  me  to  tie  myself  dovm  here,  in  Jena  ?  I 
have  gained  nothing,  absolutely  nothing,  thereby,  but 
have  lost  an  immeasurable  deal.     If  I  were  not  here, 


284  THE  LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

I  could  live  where  I  liked,  could  try  to  carry  out  plans 
for  settling  myself  in  life  with  far  greater  ease  thau 
at  present,  as  all  my  time  would  be  my  own."  He 
was  still  hoping  that  his  friend,  the  Koadjutor  of  the 
Kurfiirst  of  Mainz,  would  get  him  some  appointment 
in  that  town ;  he  thought,  too,  of  going  to  Berhn  or 
Vienna.  At  this  time  he  had  singular  dealings  witli 
the  Jena  senate.  It  seems  that  on  the  title-page  of 
his  printed  "  Introductory  Lecture  "  he  had  styled  him- 
self professor  of  history.  But  this  touched  the  rights 
of  Professor  Heinrich,  who,  properly  speaking,  was 
the  real  professor  of  history  at  Jena.  Heinrich,  in 
a  miserable  spirit  of  wounded  vanity,  insisted  that  the 
title  should  be  changed,  that  Schiller  should  call  him- 
self what  he  was,  professor  of  philosophy.  He  even 
caused  the  advertisement  exposed  at  the  book-shop  to 
be  torn  down  by  a  college  servant,  thus  making  him- 
self for  ever  ridiculous  by  such  petty  show  of  insolence 
toward  genius.  The  senate,  however,  had  of  course  to 
declare  the  Professor  historiarum  in  the  right. 

The  Koadjutor's  friendly  reply  unfortunately  gave 
Schiller  no  immediate  ground  for  hope.  Did  it  depend 
on  him,  he  said,  he  would  put  the  poet  in  such  a  posi- 
tion at  Mainz  or  Erfurt  as  would  let  him  give  pinions 
to  his  muse  unchecked.  But  it  was  the  Kurfiirst  who 
ruled  matters,  and  who,  justly  enough,  wished  that 
.  men  of  such  merit  should  apply  directly  to  him.  By 
staying  in  Jena,  Schiller  deemed  it  impossible  to 
hasten  on  his  marriage  with  Lotte  or  to  bring  her 
sister  to  his  side,  for,  being  still  in  debt,  the  receipt 
from  his  lectures  yielded  him  no  sure  income. 

Lotte  still  feared  that  one  day  she  might  cease  to 
be  to  him  all  that  she  was  now.  In  a  letter  to  the 
sisters,  he  calms  such  fear.  "  Caroline,"  he  says,  "  Caro- 
line is  nearer  to  me  in  age,  and  thus  her  thoughts,  her 
feelings,  are  more  on  a  level  with  mine  ;  she  has  worked 
more   upon   my  sense   for  utterance  than   you,  Lotte 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  285 

mine,  —  but  for  all  the  world  I  would  not  have  you 
other  than  you  are.  Those  advantages  which  Caroline 
has,  you  must  get  from  me ;  in  my  love  your  being 
must  develop  itself,  you  must  be  my  creation,  your 
season  of  blossoming  must  fall  in  the  springtime  of 
my  love.  Had  we  found  each  other  later,  you  would 
have  robbed  me  of  this  delight  of  watching  you  bloom 
to  perfect  beauty  —  for  me." 

He  now  looked  forward  to  the  2d  of  December,  the 
date  fixed  for  his  journey  to  Weimar.  While  there  he 
hoped  to  see  Lotte  sometimes ;  even  occasional  visits  to 
Jena  were  not  unlikely.  He  sighed  for  the  soft  spring 
days  to  come  on ;  he  longed  for  the  time  when  he 
should  be  at  Eudolstadt  with  her.  The  pleasantest 
time  for  him  now  was  when  the  lectures  were  over 
on  Friday  evenings,  and  he  had  a  few  days  to  spend 
undisturbed  in  thinking  of  his  beloved  ones.  Lotte 
asked  him  to  come  to  Rudolstadt  at  the  end  of  each 
week,  but,  to  his  grief,  he  was  obliged  to  decline  this 
invitation.  For  to  others  these  visits  might  seem 
strange,  and  neither  of  them  would  rightly  enjoy  such 
hasty  meetings.  He  dare  not  even  show  himself  in 
Weimar  until  Christmas,  if  he  would  avoid  notice.  In 
the  early  part  of  the  year  he  intended  to  ask  the  Duke 
of  Weimar  for  a  stipend  which  at  the  most  would  not 
exceed  two  hundred  thalers,  but  he  still  despaired  of 
soon  marrying,  as  his  letter  to  Korner  of  23d  Novem- 
ber shows.  Yet,  four  days  afterward,  he  tells  the 
sisters  that  Lotte  must  as  soon  as  possible  share  his 
life  with  him  at  Jena,  where  he  meant  to  remain  for 
some  years  longer. 

"  I  know  not  how  else  I  could  bear  it !  No  bright 
outlook  for  me  in  the  future,  and  this  restless  longing 
at  my  heart !  .  .  .  Head  and  heart  will  not  support 
so  long  and  violent  a  strain,  and  even  as  an  aid  to 
work,  it  is  needful  that  after  mental  exhaustion  I 
should  be  refreshed  by  pleasures  of  the  heart.     This 


286  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

unrest  of  mind  hinders  me  from  bettering,  so  far  as 
possible,  my  prospects,  for  it  keeps  me  from  all  work. 
I  have  no  gladdening  genius  at  hand,  without  which 
all  striving  is  vain."  He  calculates  that  if,  at  Easter, 
the  duke  should  grant  him  150  thalers,  and  if  the 
lectures  only  brought  him  in  as  much,  his  literary 
earnings  at  the  least  amounted  to  four  hundred 
thalers,  so  that  his  yearly  income  might  be  estimated 
at  seven  hundred  thalers.  On  this  they  might  manage 
to  hve,  even  if  Lotte's  mother  did  not  contribute, 
though  she  had  done  so  in  Caroline's  case.  But  they 
would  not  settle  in  Jena,  where  he  had  no  intention 
of  remaining.  For  in  two  years  he  might  go  to  Mainz, 
or  receive  some  post  at  the  Berlin  Academy.  Caroline 
would  of  course  have  to  stay  in  Eudolstadt ;  there  was 
no  help  for  this.     Lotte  gleefully  agreed  to  all. 

Early  in  the  afternoon  of  2d  December  the  sisters 
reached  Jena.  They  at  once  sent  for  Schiller  and 
spent  a  couple  of  hours  with  him  in  confidential  talk, 
not  going  to  Griesbach's  house  until  just  before  start- 
ing on  their  journey.  Schiller  had  to  lecture  from 
five  to  six.  Shortly  before  six  the  ladies  drove  off 
with  their  maid  and  a  man  servant.  Directly  after  his 
lecture  Schiller  followed  them  on  horseback,  and  rode 
for  a  long  way  in  the  moonlight  beside  their  carriage. 
While  returning  he  tortured  himself  by  the  thought 
that  perhaps  he  had  shown  them  too  little  care,  that, 
in  this  haste,  he  had  not  given  vent  to  all  the  brim- 
ming love  at  his  heart.  On  the  4th  the  duke  came 
to  Jena,  with  Goethe  and  the  Koadjutor,  and  was 
introduced  to  the  professors.  The  Koadjutor  showed 
himself  very  friendly  to  Schiller,  questioning  him  as 
to  his  position  in  the  town,  as  to  his  writings  and 
present  literary  employment,  though  in  doing  this  he 
was  often  interrupted  by  the  duke.  All  Schiller's 
thoughts  were  now  set  upon  hastening  his  and  Lotte's 
"  entire  union."     In  Weimar  people  spoke  already  of 


THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  287 

their  engagement ;  at  all  cost  they  must  prevent  the 
mother  from  hearing  about  it  through  strangers.  As 
Goethe  at  court  had  shown  such  politeness  to  Lotte, 
and  was  not  unversed  in  such  matters,  Schiller  thought 
she  should  entrust  him  with  their  secret,  so  that,  if 
possible,  Goethe  might  further  their  plan  of  getting 
married  in  the  spring.  Most  singular  was  Frau  von 
Kalb's  conduct.  In  the  beginning  of  November  she 
had  written  her  faithless  swain  a  "  strange  "  letter,  for 
she  found  it  so  hard  to  give  him  up.  There  was  bitter 
recrimination  with  her  husband,  who  had  accompanied 
her  to  Weimar,  whither  her  brother-in-law,  the  presi- 
dent, and  his  wife  also  came.  A  divorce  was  talked  of 
and  arrangements  made  for  the  division  of  their  prop- 
erty, but  all  was  thwarted  by  Caroline's  refusal  to  give 
up  the  guardianship  of  her  son.  She  fell  ill  herself, 
but  was  soon  so  far  convalescent  that  Lotte  could  visit 
her.  Schiller  cautioned  his  fiancee,  against  Charlotte : 
she  was  unfair  toward  her,  he  said,  and  took  a  cold, 
biassed  view  of  their  love ;  she  felt  offended  at  his  not 
coming  to  see  her,  but  his  presence  would  wound  her 
even  more,  for  she  was  in  no  way  capable  of  sympa- 
thising with  his  love.  Frau  von  Kalb  invited  Lotte 
to  her  house,  and  in  manner  toward  her  was  composed 
and  friendly ;  Caroline  also  had  to  pay  her-  a  visit.' 
But  just  this  interest  which  Charlotte  showed  for  the 
Lengenfelds  made  Schiller  suspect  that  she  was  weav- 
ing some  new  plot  or  other,  and  that  .she  had  not 
wholly  renounced  him. 

On  the  12tli  he  arrived  at  Weimar,  where  he  lodged 
close  to  the  Lengenfelds,  at  "  Tlie  Elephant,"  on  the 
south  side  of  the  market-place.  Ostensibly  he  had 
come  hither  to  attend  a  performance  of  Goethe's 
"  Claudine,"  though  on  the  evening  of  his  arrival 
another  play,  Weisze's  tragedy,  "  Fanaticism ;  or,  Jean 
Calas,"  was  given.  This  time  Schiller  surprised  the 
sisters  by  proposing  a  totally  different  plan  of  action, 


288  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

according  to  which,  all  help  from  the  duke  should  be 
refused,  and  Frau  von  Leugeufeld  spared  the  pain  of 
parting  with  her  daughter.  For  he  meditated  living 
with  Lotte  at  Rudolstadt  in  a  house  adjoining  her 
present  home.  His  income  would  amount  to  three 
hundred  thalers,  while  Lotte  was  to  have  another  two 
hundred  from  her  mother.  He  needed  about  two  hun- 
dred for  himself,  and  the  Thalia  alone  would  brhig 
him  in  the  requisite  five  hundred  for  housekeeping. 
He  had  quite  giveu  up  his  connection  with  Wieland's 
Mercur,  issued  now  in  altered  form,  as  the  only 
actual  change  was  that  Wieland  should  write  more 
for  it  and  give  special  attention  to  the  newest  German 
literature.  Helped  by  a  few  able  writers,  he  hoped 
with  very  little  labour  on  his  part  to  earn  from  three 
to  four  hundred  thalers  by  the  "  Memoirs."  At  Easter 
he  would  ask  for  a  fixed  salary,  and,  if  tliis  were  re- 
fused, he  should  resign  the  professorship  and  spend  four 
or  five  years  in  study,  in  training  and  strengthening 
his  mental  powers  before  giving  public  proof  of  them. 
It  occurred  to  him  later  that  he  might  take  a  year's 
holiday  in  which  to  finish  his  "  Revolt  of  the  Nether- 
lands." He  could  only  stay  a  night  at  Weimar,  and 
rode  back  to  Jena  early  the  next  morning.  The  sisters 
drove  to  Erfurt  on  the  14th,  and  while  here  they  sud- 
denly decided  to  tell  their  mother  of  the  engagement. 
Not  a  word  of  this  had  been  said  when  Schiller  met 
them  at  Weimar.  They  called  upon  the  Koad  jutor ;  he 
was  most  amiable,  and  told  them  that  Goethe  was  also 
in  the  secret.  Caroline  now  helped  to  bring  about  the 
engagement  of  her  friend  Fraulein  von  Dacheroden 
with  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt,  and  obtained  permission 
from  that  lady's  father  to  take  her  to  Weimar.  Frau 
von  Lengenfeld,  on  receiving  her  daughter's  letter,  was 
so  surprised,  so  agitated,  as  to  be  unable  to  send  a  word 
in  answer,  only  Lotte  must  feel  assured  that  she  only 
wished  for  her  happiness.     Not   until   the   18th   did 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  289 

Schiller  write,  asking  for  Lotte's  hand,  saying  that  if 
love  could  make  her  happy,  such  love  was  his  to  give. 

In  the  afternoon  of  the  19th  he  came  with  the 
Paulus  family  to  Weimar,  where  he  met  his  beloved, 
and  spent  a  happy  time  with  her ;  he  was  at  the 
theatre,  too,  to  see  an  act  of  his  friend  Neumann's 
play,  "Kunz  von  Kaufungen."  He  learnt  that  the 
duke  had  called  that  afternoon  upon  Fiau  von  Stein, 
and  had  asked  her  about  Lotte's  engagement.  His 
Grace  approved  of  it,  and  seemed  not  unwilling  to 
grant  the  wished-for  salary.  Schiller,  so  soon  as  he 
had  the  mother's  consent,  intended  to  tell  the  duke 
everything,  asking  only  for  a  year's  leave  of  absence, 
not  for  a  salary,  which  the  duke  for  his  merits'  sake 
might  offer  him  later.  He  returned  to  Jena  that 
night.  Lotte  next  day  was  sharply  upbraided  at  the 
court  by  Frau  von  Kalb,  who  complained  that  Schiller 
had  not  visited  her.  Goethe  was  away  at  this  time, 
in  Jena,  wholly  taken  up  in  completing  his  treatise  on 
the  metamorphosis  of  plants.  Schiller  did  not  see 
him,  but  wrote  in  a  letter,  "  I  should  be  glad,  could  I 
be  more  to  him."  The  old  frankness  toward  Korner 
was  once  more  established,  who  was  overjoyed :  Schil- 
ler, too,  felt  as  though  freed  from  a  nightmare. 

On  the  2 2d  he  got  the  mother's  answer,  who  de- 
clared herself  ready  to  give  him  her  best  and  dearest 
possession,  as  Lotte's  love  and  his  own  noble-minded- 
ness were  sufficient  surety  for  her  daughter's  happi- 
ness ;  she  wished  only  to  feel  at  ease  as  to  his  means  of 
Kvelihood,  for  without  an  adequate  income  there  could 
be  no  happiness  in  the  home.  Schiller,  in  grateful 
joy,  at  once  replied  to  this  letter.  If  the  duke,  he  said, 
were  to  grant  him  150  or  two  hundred  thalers,  his 
yearly  income  might  safely  be  reckoned  at  eight  hun- 
dred thalers.  He  would  write  to  the  duke  next  day, 
and  if  his  Grace  put  him  off  with  promises  until  1791, 
for  1790  he  had  a  proposal  to  make  that  perhaps  she 


290  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

would  not  dislike.  Simultaneously  with  this  letter  he 
sent  one  to  the  Duke  of  Meiuingen,  asking  him  to  con- 
fer upon  him  the  title  of  Count  Councillor  (Hofiath  ). 
For  Lotte,  by  marrying  him,  sacrificed  her  rank,  and 
Schiller  wished  to  make  up  in  some  measure  for  such 
loss.  He  hopefully  awaited  the  request  made  on  the 
23d  to  the  Duke  of  Weimar ;  yet,  be  it  what  it  might, 
he  felt  quite  easy  as  to  his  income.  Just  then 
Goeschen  asked  him  to  furnish  an  article  on  the 
"  Thirty  Years'  War "  for  his  Historical  Ladies'  Cal- 
endar. The  fee  offered  was  four  hundred  thalers. 
The  subject  had  long  attracted  him,  and  the  task 
seemed  an  easy  one,  as  he  had  only  to  content  dilet- 
tanti —  not  students  of  history.  So  this  commission 
came  to  him  as  a  veritable  marriage  portion.  The 
wedding  was  to  take  place  at  Easter ;  he  intended  to 
hire  the  other  rooms  on  the  same  floor  as  his  present 
lodging;  and  there  was  no  need  to  trouble  about 
furnishing  them. 

Full  of  his  joy,  he  hastened  to  spend  Christmas  Eve 
at  Weimar.  There  he  found  Laroche  and  FrJiulein 
Dacheroden  with  her  fiancS,  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt, 
whose  acquaintance  he  now  made.  He  returned  on 
the  26th.  Lotte  and  Humboldt  visited  Goethe  on  the 
28th,  to  whom  on  Christmas  Day  a  son  —  his  first  — 
had  been  born.  The  poet  had  invited  them  to  come 
to  him  that  morning ;  he  showed  them  choice  engrav- 
ings, and  was  most  friendly  and  confidential.  On  that 
or  on  the  following  day  Humboldt  arrived  at  Jena, 
where  he  stayed  with  Schiller,  and  they  visited  the 
neighbourhood  in  company.  Schiller,  wholly  absorbed 
in  his  love,  thought  Humljoldt  too  liiglity,  his  identity 
too  broken  up ;  knowledge  had  enriched  his  mind  and 
set  it  working ;  but  he  needed  depth.  His  heart  was 
a  noble  one,  but  there  was  wanting  to  him  the  rest,  the 
calm  of  a  soul  which  fondly  cherishes  its  object,  and 
which  keeps  staunchly  to  its  most  loved  creation. 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  291 

Humboldt  was  Schiller's  junior  by  some  seven 
years.  Versed  not  only  in  law  and  politics,  but  also 
in  philosophy  and  the  modern  languages,  he  had  mixed 
much  in  good  society,  and  belonged  to  Henriette  Herz's 
circle  of  intellectual  acquaintances,  having  Jacobi  and 
Forster  as  his  most  intimate  friends.  He  felt  very 
wishful  to  know  the  famous  poet  and  historian  who 
had  given  "  Tha  Robbers "  and  the  "  Revolt  of  the 
Netherlands "  to  an  admiring  world ;  but  Schiller  was 
then  in  no  temper  to  understand  him.  Humboldt  well 
saw  how  deeply  the  poet  loved  Lotte,  and  he  urged 
him  to  use  every  effort  toward  hastening  on  the 
marriage. 

On  the  last  day  of  the  year  Schiller  felt  driven  to 
return  to  Weimar.  The  duke  no  sooner  knew  of  his 
arrival  than  he  sent  for  him  to  give  his  request  a 
personal  answer.  He  would  gladly  do  something,  said 
the  duke,  to  show  his  regard ;  yet  unfortunately,  added 
he,  with  lowered  voice  and  in  some  confusion,  unfortu- 
nately he  could  not  afford  to  give  more  than  two  hun- 
dred thalers.  Schiller  expressed  himself  completely 
satisfied  with  such  a  salary,  and  gave  the  duke  his 
warmest  thanks,  who  then  questioned  him  as  to  the 
date  fixed  for  the  wedding. 

Fraulein  Dacheroden,  Laroche,  and  Humboldt  were 
still  in  Weimar,  so  Schiller  met  them  again.  On  the 
first  evening  they  went  to  the  theatre,  where  he  saw 
Kotzebue's  immensely  successful  play, "  Human  Hatred 
and  Remorse,"  which  Korner  had  told  him  was  a 
wretchedly  feeble  piece.  Still,  he  wanted  to  see  it, 
and  though  the  friends  made  merry  over  its  false 
sentiment  and  want  of  power,  he  felt  genuinely 
aggrieved  that  the  taste  of  playgoers  should  have 
sunk  so  low.  The  author,  a  native  of  Weimar,  who 
had  risen  under  the  Russian  government  to  be  Presi- 
dent of  the  Magistracy  of  Esthonia  (in  virtue  of  which 
office  he  put  the  von  before  his  name),  scored  a  triumph 


292  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

with  this  most  affecting  drama.  Through  the  very 
distaste  with  which  Europe  received  his  work,  he  grew 
famous ;  and  it  marks  the  beginning  of  that  flood  of 
Kotzebue-plays,  poured  forth  as  an  antidote  to  Iffland's 
domestic  pictures  and  to  Schiller's  dramas,  at  a  time 
when  that  poet's  genius  was  turned  to  history  and  the 
philosophical  side  of  art.  But  let  us  go  back  to  our 
friends.  They  spent  pleasant  evenings  together  at  a  gay 
cafe,  for  Humboldt  liked  such  distraction.  On  New 
Year's  Day  Schiller  dined  with  the  sisters  at  Frau  von 
Stein's,  who  now  encouraged  the  match  of  which  she 
had  before  disapproved,  owing  to  the  poet's  ill  health. 
The  duke  himself  came  to  her  house,  and  declared, 
with  a  droll  air  of  self-satisfaction,  that  he  had  given 
the  best  thing  toward  the  marriage,  namely,  the  money. 
Instead  of  the  expected  reply  from  Frau  von  Lengen- 
feld,  the  poet  while  at  Weimar  received  news  of  the 
serious  illness  of  his  mother,  and  this  greatly  dulled 
his  happiness. 

When  at  Jena,  a  letter  came  from  Christophine, 
stating  Frau  Schiller's  condition  to  be  hopeless,  but  it 
was  soon  followed  by  other  and  more  comforting  re- 
ports. Lotte's  mother  still  delayed  sending  her  deci- 
sion, for  which  Schiller  now  clamoured.  Their  speedy 
union  was  necessary  to  him  amid  so  much  work,  for 
this  waiting  and  longing  did  but  disturb  and  unsettle 
his  mind.  He  confessed  to  the  sisters :  "  I  have  never 
seemed  so  poor,  so  small  to  myself,  as  now,  at  the 
approach  of  my  most  blissful  happiness.  The  present 
is  no  more  anything  to  me ;  the  joys  of  hope  are  no 
longer  mine ;  and  still  you  are  yet  far  from  me.  I 
gladly  lose  identity  to  take  it  again,  enriched  and 
beautified,  from  the  hands  of  love,  from  your 
hands." 

On  the  12th,  the  mother-in-law's  consent  reached 
him,  who  promised  Lotte  an  annuity  of  150  thalers  so 
long  as  she  remained  his  wife.     In  a  few  weeks  Frau 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  293 

von  Lengenfeld  would  come  to  Jena,  and  the  wedding 
could  take  place  on  the  day  following  her  arrival, 
either  there,  or  at  a  neighbouring  \T.llage.  Directly 
after  this  Schiller  received  patents  from  the  Duke  of 
Meiningen,  conferring  on  him  the  title  of  Hofrath 
without  cost,  and  this  was  specially  pleasing  to  the 
mother  of  his  bride.  He  at  once  let  notice  of  his 
new  rank  be  published  in  the  Liter atur  Zeitung.  In 
this  exciting  time  he  found  the  six  weekly  lectures 
very  tedious.  It  is  true,  he  no  longer  worked  them 
out  carefully,  but  delivered  them  extempore,  which 
saved  him  the  time  spent  in  writing  them  down,  but 
the  facts  and  the  hue  to  follow  in  each  lecture  had 
for  this  cause  to  be  fixed  firmer  in  his  mind. 

A  separation  of  more  than  a  fortnight  was  intolerable 
to  the  lovers.  During  the  two  delightful  days  Schiller 
spent  with  the  sisters  they  planned  the  arrangement 
of  their  home.  But  when  Lotto's  mother  hesitated  to 
let  the  marriage  be  fixed  for  a  day  before  Easter, 
SchiUer,  in  his  disappointment,  excitedly  begged  the 
sisters  to  wiite  less  often,  as  their  correspondence  now 
agitated  him  overmuch.  "  Otherwise,"  said  he,  "  I  lose 
fitness  for  all  work,  and  my  existence  becomes  un- 
bearable ;  how  this  attempt  will  succeed,  I  know  not ; 
but  I  must  try  to  rouse  my  interest  in  something 
scientific."  Lotte  felt  all  the  happier,  fully  convinced, 
now,  that  some  good  genius  had  so  formed  her  char- 
acter as  one  day  helpfully  to  influence  his ;  her  dis- 
position, her  way  of  looking  at  things,  would  never 
jar  upon  him,  she  said.  Wishing  to  do  all  that  was 
possible  for  his  amusement,  she  was  now  taking  gi'eat 
pains  with  her  music,  in  which  she  had  already  made 
a  good  start ;  besides  this,  she  means  to  draw  and  read 
much,  so  that  their  evenings  may  always  pass  pleas- 
antly by.  An  active  life  of  retirement,  she  observed, 
would  help  to  give  her  that  peace  which  abides ;  she 
must  live  for  her  soul,  her  heart ;  and  this  she  could 


294  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

most  fitly  do  in  the  time  that  lay  before  her,  spent  in 
the  sunlight  of  a  husband's  love. 

After  lecturing,  on  the  evening  of  the  29th,  Schiller 
drove  with  Paulus  and  his  wife  to  the  masked  liall, 
held  annually  in  honour  of  the  grand  duchess's  birth- 
day. Here,  at  this  ball,  three  years  ago,  he  had  had 
the  joyful  surprise  of  meeting  Lotte.  The  sisters 
came  to  it  also,  and  he  stayed  with  them  until  five 
o'clock  next  afternoon,  managing  to  spend  much  of 
the  time  alone  with  his  betrothed.  Frau  von  Lengen- 
feld  had  fixed  to  come  on  the  10th  or  12th  of  February. 
As  there  was  not  sufficient  room  in  Schiller's  house  for 
the  reception  of  Caroline  and  her  mother,  spacious  and 
well-furnished  apartments  were  taken  for  them  at 
Frauleiu  von  Seegners',  close  by,  at  the  "  not  very 
cheap  "  rate  of  fifteen  thalers  the  half-year.  But  un- 
fortunately the  mother's  coming  was  postponed. 

Meanwhile,  he  gave  Korner  explanation  as  to  his 
choice,  saying  that,  in  taking  a  wife  for  himself,  happily 
he  had  won  a  heart  that  was  noble,  a  nature  that  was 
finely  touched. 

"  I  rejoice  at  your  present  joy,"  wrote  Korner,  in 
reply,  "  but  from  this  union,  too,  I  believe  I  may  hope 
great  things  for  your  after  life.  Without  paltry  de- 
liberation, you  have  chosen  a  wife  suited  to  your 
individual  need,  and  by  no  other  road  could  you  have 
found  the  treasure  wanting  to  you  —  a  happy  home. 
You  are  not  fitted  to  live  as  an  isolated  being,  just 
for  selfish  enjoyment ;  though  some  luminous  idea  may 
flash  on  you,  blotting  out  for  a  time  all  else  save  an 
intoxicating  sense  of  your  own  superiority,  still  the 
need  of  loving  and  of  being  loved  soon  comes  back  to 
you.  1  know,  I  understand,  the  pulses  of  your  friend- 
ship and  how  fitful  they  are.  Yet  they  do  not  set  me 
at  a  distance  from  you ;  they  are  essential  to  your 
character,  are  joined  to  other  qualities  that  T  would 
not  wish   changed.     So,   with  your    love,  it  will  not 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  295 

be  otherwise ;  and  were  I  sufficiently  intimate  with 
your  wife,  to  venture  it,  I  would  wish  her  no  better 
thing  on  her  wedding-day  than  to  have  the  tact  not  to 
misunderstand  you  in  such  moments." 

Schiller  let  Lotte  see  the  letter,  who  thought  Kcirner 
was  perfectly  right.  Love,  she  said  was  not  the 
sketching-out  for  oneself  of  some  immaculate  hero ; 
it  was  to  love  men,  just  as  they  were,  and  to  treat 
their  feehngs  with  a  heart  full  of  charity.  And  so, 
she  hoped  that  Scliiller,  too,  would  forgive  her,  if  by 
a  too  great  show  of  zeal  or  calm,  or  by  a  proneness 
to  melancholy,  she  should  at  times  dull  for  him  the 
brightness  of  her  love. 

While  now  the  old  frank  footing  had  once  more 
been  estabhshed  between  the  friends,  Frau  von  Kalb 
showed  increasing  bitterness  toward  the  happy  lovers. 
She  held  Schiller  guilty  of  faithlessness  as  base  as  that 
with  which  Frau  von  Stein  in  her  fury  charged  Goethe. 
She  wrote  him,  after  her  vehement  way,  a  "  most  un- 
gracious "  letter,  warning  him  among  other  things 
against  "  poisonous  tongues,"  that  he  "  never  should 
have  suffered  to  speak  truth."  When  sending  an 
answer,  she  begged  him  to  write  her  address  accurately, 
that  the  letter  might  not  fall  into  her  sister's  hands. 
Schiller  had  already  twice  avoided  seeing  her,  once, 
when  she  spoke  of  something  highly  important  that 
she  had  to  tell  him.  And  when,  dreading  a  scene,  he 
positively  refused  to  meet  her,  she  mentioned,  as  reason 
for  the  interview,  a  matter  that  could  well  have  been 
discussed  on  paper.  In  reply  to  his  judgment  that  she 
was  hardly  in  a  fit  mood  to  make  their  meeting  an 
agreeable  one,  she  said  that  he  erred  in  connecting  her 
present  conduct  with  "  that  madness,"  "  that  grotesque 
and  long-forgotten  dream,"  meaning  the  past.  Schiller 
then  assured  her  that,  as  bygones  were  vriped  out 
from  her  memory,  he  was  at  last  able  to  speak  frankly 
of  all  his  coming  happiness,  which  in  the  fulness  of 


296  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

his  heart  he  then  described.  Care  was  really  necessary, 
he  said,  in  writing  the  address,  as  some  letters  sent 
by  him  to  Weimar  had  actually  fallen  into  strange 
hands.  The  sisters  suspected  Frau  von  Kalb  of  having 
intercepted  one  of  their  letters  to  Schiller,  which, 
after  some  delay,  reached  him  with  only  one  wrapper 
round  it.  They  also  believed  her  to  be  the  author  of 
an  anonymous  letter  sent  to  Lotte,  telling  her  to  try 
and  become  a  good  housewife,  instead  of  hunting  after 
poets.  It  was  she,  so  Lotte  thought,  who  had  spread 
the  rumour  that  Schiller  was  in  love  with  Caroline  and 
not  with  her.  They  met  soon  after  at  Frau  von  Stein's, 
when  Charlotte  was  icy  in  manner  and  seemed  warring 
with  inward  grief. 

Schiller's  bliss  is  shown  in  the  words :  "  I  can  now 
scarcely  survey  all  my  beautiful  possessions.  How 
much  that  is  noble  and  excellent  am  I  taking  to  my- 
self and  calling  mine !  My  heart  is  fused  into  one 
great  and  glorious  sensation."  And,  to  fulfil  his  cup 
of  happiness,  the  voice  of  genius  now  spoke  forth 
again,  after  long  silence.  He  succeeded  in  completing 
Hutton's  monologue  in  "  The  Manhater."  "  Love  and 
the  poet's  genius  are  not  jealous  of  each  other,"  he 
says ;  "  it  is  rather  to  their  advantage  (in  my  case,  at 
least)  to  keep  friends.  I  can  in  no  way  describe  to 
you,  my  dearest  ones,  how  glad  I  feel  at  the  prospect 
of  working  at  poetry  in  your  midst.  To  blend  the 
fullest  meed  of  artistic  enjoyment  "with  that  of  the 
heart  had  always  been  my  highest  ideal  of  life,  and  in 
joining  both  these  pleasures  I  have  the  surest  way  of 
l)ringing  each  to  its  highest  perfection.  .  .  .  Love  alone, 
without  this  inward  bent  for  work,  would  soon  with- 
draw from  me  its  fairest  delights.  If  I  am  to  be 
abidingly  happy,  I  must  have  a  sense  of  my  [poetic] 
powers  —  must  feel  worthy  of  the  bliss  that  is  mine ; 
and  this  can  only  come  by  seeing  myself  reflected  in 
some  work  of  art." 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  297 

Frau  von  Lengenfeld  was  now  to  arrive  on  the  2 2d, 
the  marriage  taking  place  on  the  following  day.  Schil- 
ler should  fetch  Lotte  and  Caroline  from  Erfurt,  and 
pay  a  visit  there  to  the  Koadjutor,  who  had  been  most 
friendly  to  them  all,  offering  to  defray  the  wedding 
expenses,  which  of  course  Frau  von  Lengenfeld  could 
not  allow.  He  had  talent  as  a  painter,  and  began 
upon  a  picture  of  Hymen,  intended  for  the  bride. 
Having  made  the  necessary  clerical  arrangements,  a 
task  that  he  found  extremely  disagreeable,  and  after 
sending  back  at  her  request  all  Frau  von  Kalb's  let- 
ters, Schiller  drove  to  Erfurt  on  Thursday  evening,  the 
18th,  after  his  lecture.  He  stayed  with  the  sisters  at 
their  hotel.  The  Koadjutor  showed  him  warm  sym- 
pathy ;  so  soon  as  he  should  be  Kurfiirst,  Schiller 
must  come  to  him  at  Mainz,  where  he  would  quickly 
find  him  a  good  post.  The  sisters  and  Fraulein  von 
Dacherciden  raved  about  the  Koadjutor,  calling  him 
their  "  gold-mine ; "  they  pictured  themselves  already 
at  Mainz,  hving  together  as  on  some  happy  island. 
And  Schiller,  too,  was  charmed  by  his  company ; 
through  him  he  felt  mentally  quickened ;  his  spark- 
ling talk  was  delightful  to  hear ;  although  perhaps 
there  was  something  willowy,  something  irresolute 
about  him.  Goethe  had  likewise  enjoyed  the  "  cease- 
less "  conversation  of  this  kind-hearted  and  sagacious 
man  of  the  world.  The  bridegroom  spent  three  pleas- 
ant days  at  Erfurt,  where  the  highest  circles  gave  him 
their  congratulations.  On  the  21st  he  drove  with  the 
Lengenfelds  through  Weimar  to  Jena ;  unfortunately 
Frau  von  Stein  could  not  accompany  them,  as  her 
husband  was  suffering  from  a  fresh  paralytic  seizure. 
At  Jena,  Herder's  wife  sent  them  her  good  wishes,  and 
they  stayed,  as  before,  at  the  Seegners'  house.  Next 
morning  they  drove  to  meet  the  mother-in-law  at 
Kahla,  and,  leading  there  at  two  o'clock,  three  hours 
later  they  reached  the  little  village  church  of  Wenigen- 


298  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

Jena.  Here  a  clergyman,  one  Gottlieb  Friedrich 
Schmid,  being  commissioned  by  Superintendent  Oem- 
ler  of  Jena,  privately  married  them.  Schiller  told 
Korner  that  "  the  scene  was  a  very  short  one,"  for  to 
him  the  whole  ceremony  seemed  but  an  empty  form, 
that,  however,  he  had  to  go  through.  Lotte  could  not 
resist  sketching  the  httle  church  where  Heaven's  bless- 
ing had  consecrated  their  marriage  vows. 

"  We  spent  the  evening  in  quiet  talk  over  our  tea," 
wrote  she,  in  her  widowhood,  sixteen  years  later. 
Without  any  show,  the  poet  brought  his  wife  to  their 
modest  yet  well-appointed  home,  where  his  highest 
happiness  was  now  centred.  All  attempts  to  surprise 
him  on  the  part  of  the  students  or  their  professors  he 
had  fortunately  escaped. 


CHAPTER   II. 

FROM    FEBRUARY,    1790,    TO    OCTOBER,    1791. 

Ten  joyful  months,  among  the  gladdest  in  all  his 
life,  were  now,  after  long  waiting,  in  store  for  our  poet. 
All  his  most  fervent  hopes  for  happy  wedlock  were 
realised  to  the  full.  Lotte  had  deep  sense  of  her  hus- 
band's worth ;  in  raising,  in  beautifying  his  life,  she 
found  at  once  her  holiest  duty  and  her  sweetest  pleas- 
ure. She  seemed  destined  to  ward  off  all  his  cares,  to 
give  him  all  her  heart's  sympathy  and  attachment,  a 
close  sharer  of  his  mental  life,  moulding  herself  upon 
his  pattern,  and  aiming  ever  to  make  him  glad.  Be- 
sides her  drawing,  she  made  diligent  progress  with  her 
singing  and  playing,  for  Schiller  was  cheered  by  music, 
whose  charm  Goethe  too  had  found  helpful  toward 
calming  the  soul,  and  toward  kindling  the  fires  of 
poesy.  Italian  also  formed  another  subject  for  study. 
As  a  husband,  Schiller  was  tenderness  itself,  freely 
yielding  back  to  his  wife,  his  "  little  mouse,"  as  he 
called  her,  all  the  affection  which  she  lavished  upon 
him. 

The  landlady  saved  Lotte  all  trouble  as  regarded 
household  matters ;  they  were  well  waited  on  by  two 
servants,  and  their  home  had  all  that  pleasant  neatness 
which  was  needed  to  make  it  comfortable  and  tranquil. 
The  Koadjutor's  promises  laid  bare  bright  visions  for 
them  in  the  future,  and  there  was  much  hoping  that 
the  old  Kurfiirst,  "  the  papa,"  would  soon  shufHe  off 
this  mortal  coil,  and  even  droll  surmising  as  to  how, 
while  yet  living,  he  might  forfeit  his  rank. 

299 


300  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

The  first  week  of  their  honeymoon  was  disturbed  by 
visits  from  the  mother-iu-law  and  Frau  von  Stein,  At 
the  beginning  of  March  Schiller  returned  to  active 
work.  The  lectures  in  particular  took  up  much  of  liis 
time;  he  had  been  overcareless  with  them,  and  had 
often  missed  lecturing,  so  that  now  he  must  hasten 
to  recover  what  was  lost ;  then,  too,  his  second  volume 
of  "  Memoirs  "  needed  revision.  Goeschen  clamoured 
for  the  tenth  number  of  Thalia^  and  Schiller  was 
still  busied  with  scenes  to  appear  in  it  from  "  The 
Mauhater."  Amid  all  this  crush  of  work  he  longed  to 
find  some  congenial  subject  of  a  poetic  kind  on  which 
to  spend  pains.  He  seized  anew  the  idea  of  writing 
an  epic  upon  Frederick  the  Great,  and  set  about  trans- 
lating the  second  book  of  the  ^neid,  as  a  training 
for  the  correct  form  of  verse  he  should  use.  But  in 
this  he  failed  to  succeed. 

Early  in  April  he  went  with  Lotte  and  Caroline  to 
spend  the  hohdays  at  liudolstadt,  where  he  was  every- 
where most  cordially  received.  Bvit  he  was  obliged  to 
continue  working  at  his  lectures  and  for  the  pubhshers. 
This  time  he  had  announced  the  first  part  of  his  history 
up  to  the  founding  of  the  Frankish  monarchy,  but  also 
a  lecture  of  one  hour  upon  the  theory  of  tragedy,  to 
give  play  to  his  thoughts  upon  a  favourite  subject. 
He  also  began  to  take  serious  interest  in  politics,  now 
that  the  peace  he  deemed  so  needful  was  hke  to  be 
endangered  by  a  rupture  between  Prussia  and  Austria. 
"  I  tremble  at  the  thought  of  war,"  he  tells  Korner, 
"  for  we  shall  feel  it  in  every  corner  of  Germany." 
Just  then  the  Koadjutor  had  sent  Lotte  his  painting 
of  Hymen  writing  the  names  Lengenfeld  and  Schiller 
upon  a  tree,  beside  which  were  Hippocrene,  the  Muses' 
spring,  and  the  emblems  of  Tragedy  and  History. 
When  sending  it,  he  wrote : 

"  My  daubing  is  for  me  generally  a  rest,  a  pastime 
for  leisure  hours.     This  time  I  love  and  value  it  for 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  301 

giving  the  illustrious  Schiller  and  his  amiable  wife 
pleasure."  Schiller,  hke  the  sisters,  thought  the  pic- 
ture a  skilful  piece  of  work,  even  if  in  idea  it  had  little 
that  was  original. 

When  April  ended  he  came  back  with  Lotte  to  Jena  ; 
Caroline  stayed  on  at  Rudolstadt  for  a  few  weeks.  It 
was  an  unusually  wearying  summer  for  him  ;  besides 
the  lectures  he  had  to  get  his  "  History  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  "  ready  for  Goeschen  by  August.  Certainly 
this  last  was  not  such  a  strain  to  him  as  the  "  Eevolt 
of  the  Netherlands,"  for  he  only  made  free  use  of  such 
histories  as  could  be  had  upon  the  subject  w^hen  work- 
ing out  his  conception  of  the  nature  of  this  war.  As 
a  chain  of  brilliant  pictures  of  the  battles  and  their 
leaders,  his  work  should  aim  at  instructing  and  de- 
lighting a  wide  circle.  The  book  gained  by  being 
written  at  such  enforced  speed,  carrying  its  readers 
away  by  the  freshness  and  the  fire  of  its  descriptions, 
as  by  its  searching  flashes  of  thought.  While  bur- 
dened by  all  this  work,  to  which  were  given  up  four- 
teen hours  of  each  day,  he  thoroughly  valued  the  joys 
of  home ;  he  had  long  felt  the  need  of  them.  The 
lectures  on  Tragedy  deeply  interested  him,  exhausting 
though  they  were ;  the  keen  sympathy  of  his  audience 
inspirited  him ;  so  that,  as  he  told  Caroline,  each  week 
he  had  a  cheering  hour  in  a  place  where  cheering  hours 
could  scarcely  be  sought.  "  I  disclose  many  experi- 
ences," said  he,  "  gained  already  by  my  practice  in  the 
art  of  tragedy,  and  which  I  myself  never  knew  that  I 
possessed.  I  seek  the  philosophic  basis  for  these  experi- 
ences, that  thus  insensibly  range  themselves  into  one 
luminous  and  coherent  whole."  He  was  amused  once 
when,  during  the  lecture,  Lotte  made  tea  for  him  in  a 
side-room,  and  listened  to  him  for  two  hours.  Yet 
with  all  this  business  there  was  still  time  for  pleasure 
and  for  excursions  to  the  many  lovely  places  Ijing 
around  Jena.    Weimar  was  also  visited,  where  Herder's 


302  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

praise  of  Schiller's  "  General  Survey  "  was  most  grati- 
fying to  its  author.  In  Jena  he  knew  no  one  inti- 
mately, except  his  countryman  Paulus,  whose  young 
wife  attracted  him  by  her  sweet  singing  and  charming 
gaiety  of  manner. 

It  was  grievous,  his  first  parting  with  Lotte,  when, 
on  26th  July,  she  went  to  Eudolstadt,  to  join  in  the 
festivities  of  her  mother's  birthday.  She  was  also  to 
comfort  Caroline,  unable  as  yet  to  come  to  any  friendly 
understanding  with  her  husband.  For  their  mother's 
sake,  they  had  to  keep  silent  as  to  a  divorce.  Schiller 
urged  Caroline  to  profit  by  her  husband's  present  lenient 
mood,  and  obtain  a  greater  share  of  liberty.  Being 
very  pressed  for  time  to  finish  the  "  Thirty  Years'  War," 
he  resolved  to  postpone  some  of  his  lectures  by  plead- 
ing ill  health.  But,  as  if  in  punishment,  he  was  sud- 
denly seized  by  violent  toothache,  suffering  also  with 
a  swollen  face.  One  of  his  most  passionate  admirers 
now  visited  him,  the  young  Danish  poet,  Jens  Bagge- 
sen,  who  shortly  before  had  married  a  gi-anddaughter 
of  the  famous  Haller.  Baggesen,  full  of  enthusiasm 
and  reverence  for  Kant,  Schiller,  and  Eeinhold,  his 
cherished  trinity  of  great  writers,  had  come  to  Weimar 
to  make  Wieland's  acquaintance.  Wieland  most  warmly 
received  him,  entertained  him  for  a  long  while  as  his 
guest,  and  took  him  to  Jena,  to  meet  Reinhold,  with 
whom  Baggesen  was  equally  charmed.  Lotte  showed 
the  strangers  every  courtesy,  and  Schiller,  though  hin- 
dered by  physical  pain,  would  not  let  them  go  without 
his  greeting.  But  they  were  of  course  unable  to  have 
any  talk  together.  All  that  Baggesen  heard  from  others 
could  but  have  given  him  a  very  false  impression  of 
Schiller,  and  this  impression  was  probably  strengthened 
by  Reinhold,  then  vexed  with  the  poet. 

In  the  ten  verses  that  Schiller  wrote  in  Baggesen's 
album  on  10th  August,  the  poet's  lyric  is  termed  the 
fairest  crown  of  his  deservings. 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  303 

September  began  ere  the  "  History  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  "  was  brought  to  temporary  conclusion  with 
the  battle  of  Breitenfeld.  On  the  28th  Schiller  had 
got  his  free-copies  of  the  "  Ladies'  Calendar,"  adorned 
by  twelve  engravings.  Before  taking  his  holiday,  he 
must  finish  the  third  volume  of  the  "  Memoirs,"  and  the 
eleventh  number  of  Thalia.  Yet  despite  this  press 
of  work,  having  domestic  happiness,  he  felt  thoroughly 
content.  From  home,  too,  came  most  cheering  news. 
The  father  wrote  gleefully  to  say  that  all  in  Stuttgart 
were  reading  his  son's  works  with  enthusiasm,  and  that 
toward  himself  the  duke  had  grown  far  more  gracious. 
When  Lotte  and  Caroline  went  to  Eudolstadt  on  3d 
October,  Schiller  stayed  behind,  as  he  had  to  write  a 
dialogue,  half  historical,  half  philosophical,  for  the 
"  Memoirs."  Yet  so  little  inclined  was  he  for  the  task 
that  in  its  place  he  sent  a  "  poor  and  flimsy  "  sketch  of 
the  most  notable  political  events  during  the  reign  of 
Frederick  the  First.  The  materials  for  another  "  Sum- 
mary," ending  with  the  crusade  of  Conrad  III.,  were 
mainly  drawn  from  Schmidt's  "  German  History." 
When  on  the  6th  the  duke,  returning  from  Silesia, 
was  welcomed  in  Griesbach's  garden  by  the  deputies 
and  students,  the  university  sent  no  representative,  and 
Schiller  also  kept  away.  He  heard  that  his  Grace  had 
taken  "  The  Ghostseer "  with  him,  and  that  Goethe, 
who  accompanied  him,  intended  shortly  to  pay  a  long 
visit  to  Jena. 

Our  poet  had  never  felt  greater  need  of  rest  and 
change  than  after  these  months  of  exhausting  work. 
And  how  he  longed  to  be  with  those  he  loved  !  "  Your 
dear  picture  is  ever  before  me,"  he  tells  the  sisters  on 
the  8th ;  "  all  seems  to  speak  to  me  of  where  the  little 
wife  [Lotte]  walked,  and  My  Lady  Comfort  [Caroline] 
sat  enthroned.  And  to  feel  that  my  hand  can  always 
reach  what  my  heart  would  have  near  it,  to  feel  that 
we  are  inseparable,  that  is  a  sense  which  I  unceasingly 


304  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

foster  in  my  bosom,  finding  it  exhaustless  and  ever 
new."  On  the  afternoon  of  the  11th,  having  finished 
his  work  that  morning,  attended  by  a  servant,  he  rode 
to  Rudolstadt. 

He  kept  firmly  to  the  plan  of  spending  all  his  time 
with  his  wife  and  her  sister ;  writing  to  Korner,  who 
now  was  made  Appellationsrath,  he  humourously  con- 
fesses that  twelve  days  had  been  devoted  to  eating, 
drinking,  blindman's  buff,  and  chess.  Lotte  and  he 
returned  to  Jena  on  the  28th,  where  good  news  from 
his  father,  together  with  a  present  of  wine,  caused  him 
pleasure.  Shortly  after  this  was  the  old  man's  birth- 
day, which  they  gaily  celebrated.  He  at  once  began 
his  professional  duties,  that  were  more  agreeable  to 
him  than  before. 

He  had  advertised  two  private  lectures  on  general 
and  political  history,  and  another  public  one,  upon  the 
Crusades.  He  felt  elated  at  the  great  success  of  his 
"Thirty  Years'  War."  The  duke  thanked  him  cour- 
teously for  so  charming  and  remarkable  a  work  sent 
to  him  through  Voigt ;  he  told  Schiller  that  he  had 
forwarded  it  to  the  Duke  of  Brunswick.  It  had  par- 
ticular interest  for  the  duchess,  and  Frau  von  Stein 
had  read  it  a  second  time  to  her  aloud.  On  the  31st 
Goethe,  with  Lips  the  painter,  came  to  see  him ;  the 
two  were  attending  Loder's  lectures  on  myology  for  a 
few  weeks.  Goethe  brought  greetings  from  Korner, 
with  whom  he  had  spent  a  pleasant  time  in  Dresden. 
"  The  talk  soon  turned  upon  Kant,"  says  Schiller,  writ- 
ing to  his  friend.  "  It's  interesting  how  he  clothes 
everything  in  his  own  individual  fashion,  and  suddenly 
brings  out  all  that  he  has  read ;  still,  I  should  not  care 
to  argue  wdth  him  upon  subjects  that  interest  me  very 
closely.  He  completely  lacks  whole-heartedness  in 
any  profession  of  creed ;  all  philosophy  with  him  is, 
so  to  speak,  subjective ;  and  thus  conviction  and  argu- 
ment alike  cease.     Nor  do  I  wholly  approve  his  phi- 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  305 

losophy  ;  it  draws  too  largely  upon  the  sensuous  world, 
where  I  draw  upon  the  spiritual.  Moreover,  his  whole 
method  of  theorising  is  too  much  a  matter  of  the  sense 
for  me.  But  his  whole  nature  is  at  work,  and  explores 
in  every  direction,  striving  to  build  up  for  itself  a  sys- 
tematic whole  —  that  is  what  makes  him  great  in  my 
eyes."  Another  theme  for  their  talk  may  have  been 
Goethe's  "  Metamorphosis  of  Plants,"  which  SchiUer 
looked  upon  as  a  mere  theory.  He  must  have  felt 
repugnance  at  Goethe's  relationship  to  Christiane  Vul- 
pius,  though,  so  little  did  he  understand  its  nature, 
that  he  believed  the  poet's  final  piece  of  extrava- 
gance would  be  to  marry  her.  Korner  tried  to  make 
him  conquer  this  dishke  to  Goethe,  saying  it  was  good 
to  have  a  brush  with  him  so  as  to  make  them  wary  of 
going  too  far  in  their  intellectual  discussions ;  if  Goethe 
loved  the  girl,  there  was  no  reason  why  he  should  not 
make  his  life  more  bearable  by  marriage.  Goethe,  who 
reverenced  Nature,  failed  not  to  see  that  Schiller  had 
no  sympathy  for  such  reverence,  and  the  total  differ- 
ence in  their  present  employments  was  another  cause 
to  make  him  stand  aloof.  Schiller  believed  that,  work- 
ing earnestly,  he  could  become  the  first  of  Germany's 
historians ;  then,  prospects  must  certainly  open  out  to 
him.  For  some  time  past,  he  had  planned  the  issue 
of  a  "  German  Plutarch,"  of  which  two  volumes  should 
appear  annually.  By  such  work,  to  be  paid  at  the  rate 
of  not  less  than  three  louis  d'or  the  sheet,  his  literary 
powers  would  grow  more  sohd,  more  even,  more  bal- 
anced; and  so,  too,  his  lectures  would  cease  to  be  a 
needless  and  superfluous  distraction.  He  would  not 
set  his  hand  upon  drama  until  he  had  thoroughly  mas- 
tered the  principles  of  Greek  tragedy,  until  his  dim 
ideas  as  to  the  rules  of  the  art  were  changed  into  sound 
convictions. 

He  had  never  spent  a  happier  birthday  than  this 
one ;  the  crown  of  his  joy  was  reached,  and  he  could 


3o6  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

look  into  the  future  gladly,  hopefully.  It  was  in  the 
brightest  of  moods  that  he  wrote  a  review  of  Burger's 
poems,  which  the  Literatur  Zeitung  had  commissioned 
him  to  prepare  eighteen  months  ago.  While  praising 
the  author's  work,  he  showed  that  it  wanted  art ;  and 
so  failed  in  giving  to  some  the  finest  pleasure.  Schil- 
ler, of  course,  had  "  joined  the  partisans  of  Art ; "  but 
in  his  heat  to  preach  its  doctrines,  he  missed  seeing 
how  ill  would  be  their  influence  upon  one  of  Germany's 
worthiest,  if  most  luckless  poets,  for  whom  it  was  too 
late  to  strike  out  a  fresh  and  unfamiliar  path ;  and 
moreover,  how  such  criticism  would  lead  him  to  kill 
all  the  natural  charm  of  his  poetry  in  an  endeavour  to 
give  it  polish. 

During  this  winter  some  of  Schiller's  most  talented 
pupils  formed  closer  friendship  with  him.  Of  these 
we  may  first  name  the  young  Livonian,  Gustav  Beha- 
ghel  von  Adlerskron,  a  Rittmeister's  son,  who  had  left 
the  Russian  army,  his  mother  having  refused  him  any 
allowance,  and  now,  under  the  name  of  Le  Bon,  was 
studying  philosophy  and  history  in  Jena  with  great 
zeal.  Schiller's  friendliness,  and  that  of  Lotte  and 
Caroline,  gave  the  young  student,  so  he  said,  new  life, 
and  put  fire  into  a  heart  hitherto  cold  as  the  snows  of 
his  own  bleak  fatherland.  Johann  Benjamine  Erhard, 
a  young  studeut  of  medicine,  had  come  from  Niirnberg 
to  make  Schiller's  acquaintance,  who  thought  his  intel- 
lect the  richest  and  most  comprehensive  he  had  ever 
known.  Versed  in  mathematics  and  medicine,  he  was 
a  shrewd  student  of  the  Kantian  philosophy  and  an 
excellent  draughtsman  and  musician.  Schiller  also 
got  to  know  Baron  von  Herbert,  who,  on  Reinhold's 
account,  had  come  from  Klagenfurt  to  Jena,  and  also 
the  young  law-student  Friedrich  von  Hardenberg, 
another  ardent  admirer. 

Huber  and  his  friend,  Professor  Georg  Forster,  wished 
to  get  Schiller  to  settle  in  Mainz,  but  he  shrank  from 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  307 

the  difficult  and  unwelcome  task  of  securing  an  appoint- 
ment at  the  aged  Kurfiirst's  hands.  Nor  would  he  part 
with  his  independence  except  in  exchange  for  a  sub- 
stantial salary,  say  of  twelve  hundred  thalers ;  as  in 
Jena,  where  he  was  his  own  master,  he  earned  five 
hundred  thalers  by  the  professorship,  independently 
of  his  lecture-fees.  "  My  relations  to  Dalberg  grow 
ever  stronger,  closer,"  he  tells  Korner,  "  and  I  promise 
myself  an  endless  deal  from  nearer  intimacy  with  him. 
I  know  few  so  pure,  so  noble,  so  high-souled  as  he ; 
wholly  above  everything  petty  ;  full  of  warm  sympathy 
for  the  beautiful,  the  true,  the  good ;  and  yet  free  from 
rhapsody  —  grown  free  from  this,  for  he  was  not  always 
thus."  An  appointment  at  Wlirtemberg,  which  his 
father  wished  him  to  take,  did  not  tempt  him ;  least 
of  all  could  he  bring  himself  to  apply  for  this  to  the 
duke ;  reconciliation  was  impossible  yet,  impossible 
until  his  growing  fame  should  make  Karl  Eugene  more 
disposed  to  forgive.  For  this  reason  Schiller  was  glad 
to  know  that  the  "  Thirty  Years'  War  "  was  also  being 
widely  read  in  his  own  home.  His  father,  with  just 
pride,  could  tell  him  that  over  seven  thousand  copies 
were  sold ;  for  many  years  past  no  work  had  had  even 
half  such  a  vogue.  He  looked  hopefully  on  toward 
the  coming  year,  the  opening  days  of  which  he  was  to 
spend  with  the  Koadjutor  at  Erfurt. 

On  31st  December  Schiller  and  Lotte  started  for 
Erfurt,  passing  through  Weimar,  where  they  stayed 
some  hours  with  Frau  von  Stein.  At  Erfurt  their 
inn  was  the  "  Schlehdorn,"  now  the  "  Eheinischer  Hof." 
Caroline  was  also  there  with  her  husband.  The  Koad- 
jutor, who  had  already  pointed  to  drama  as  Schiller's 
proper  field,  now  recommended  him  to  write  a  play 
founded  on  the  history  of  Wallenstein.  On  2d  January 
the  poet  was  present  at  some  amateur  theatricals  at  the 
Koadjutor's,  the  first  piece  being  Zschokke's  tragedy, 
"  Count   Monaldeschi."      Next   day,  the   Kurfurst  of 


3o8  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Mainz's  birthday,  he  attended  a  meeting  of  the  Electo- 
ral Academy  of  Useful  Research,  of  which  he  was 
made  a  member.  In  the  evening  there  was  a  concert 
in  the  assembly  rooms,  given  by  the  singer  Haszler. 
Many  people  from  Weimar  came  to  it,  and  one  of  the 
pieces  executed  was  in  special  honour  of  the  Kurfih'st, 
"  the  people's  darling."  It  happened,  strangely  enough, 
that,  just  at  this  concert,  Schiller  became  so  unwell 
that  he  had  to  be  carried  in  a  sedan-chair  to  his  home. 
He  was  seized  by  rheumatic  fever,  and  so  severe  was 
the  attack  that  he  did  not  believe  he  could  recover. 
The  doctor  sought  to  allay  the  symptoms  instead  of 
thoroughly  curing  the  malady,  so  that  his  patient  might 
the  sooner  rejoin  his  friends.  Schiller  kept  his  bed  for 
one  day  only,  and  his  room  for  several  more.  The 
Koadjutor,  a  constant  visitor,  made  him  "statements 
of  the  most  positive  and  welcome  kind."  Schiller  was 
to  be  his  guest  during  the  Easter  vacation. 

Among  those  in  Erfurt  who  felt  alarm  at  Schiller's 
illness  was  an  old  love  of  his,  Henriette  von  Arnim, 
who  had  come  thither  with  her  younger  sister  in  the 
previous  October.  Carohne  von  Dacheroden  had  heard 
that  they  had  arrived  there  with  a  certain  count,  whom 
the  younger  sister  was  going  to  marry ;  they  plumed 
themselves  not  a  little  upon  knowing  Schiller.  This 
is  the  last  time  in  our  poet's  life  that  we  meet  with  the 
fascinating  Dresden  beauty.  Fate  held  strange  things 
in  store  for  her,  but  until  now  her  life  had  been  une- 
ventful. We  know  that  she  was  first  married  to  Count 
Ernst  Wilhelm  Alexander  Friedrich  von  Kunheim, 
whose  death  took  place  in  1810.  That  same  year 
Schiller's  verses  to  Henriette,  included  in  the  supple- 
ment to  his  works,  were  published,  the  editor  remark- 
ing that  he  had  received  the  lines  from  a  "  Countess 
von  K nSe  von  A ,  to  whom  they  were  ad- 
dressed." Henriette  afterward  married  the  uncle  of 
her  first  husband,  Erhard  Alexander,  Count  von  Kun- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  309 

heim,  who  owned  the  fine  estate  Kloschenen-on-the- 
AUer,  near  Friedland.  He  died  on  November  15, 
1815.  Professor  Eeusch,  of  Konigsberg,  in  May,  1821, 
made  the  acquaintance  of  the  widow,  hving  childless 
and  alone  at  her  enchanting  country-seat.  In  manner 
she  seemed  to  him  both  dignified  and  charming;  her 
features  had  still  their  beauty,  and  her  eyes  their  fire. 
On  the  walls  of  her  room  hung  Schiller's  portrait.  Not 
until  long  after  did  she  go  back  to  Dresden,  dying 
there  on  the  12th  of  January,  1847.  Her  grave  is  in 
the  Catholic  churchyard,  with  not  a  stone  even  to 
mark  the  name  of  one  so  beautiful  and  so  distinguished, 
and  whom  a  great  poet  loved. 

On  their  return  journey  Schiller  and  Lotte  stayed 
three  days  at  Weimar,  where  for  the  first  time  he  was 
presented  at  court.  Frau  von  Stein  received  him  as 
her  guest.  While  here  he  was  pleased  to  meet  Beck, 
the  Mannheim  actor,  and  his  wife,  who  had  made 
a  successful  dehut.  Other  friends  were  visited,  among 
these  Voigt,  Wieland,  Emilie  von  Berlepsch  and  Frau 
von  Kalb.  We  do  not  find  that  he  went  to  see  Goethe. 
On  the  11th  he  returned  to  Jena  alone,  commencing 
his  lectures  the  next  day.  But  immediately  after  his 
first  lecture,  the  fever  came  back  with  fresh  violence ; 
he  suffered  from  pains  in  the  side,  accompanied  by 
blood-spitting.  On  the  15th  he  writes  asking  Lotte 
to  come,  as  he  can  no  longer  bear  her  absence ;  yet 
there  was  no  danger,  he  said.  However,  his  state  grew 
more  and  more  alarming,  and  Lotte  felt  terribly  anxious. 
After  a  few  days  her  sister  Caroline  arrived,  whose  help 
and  comfort  she  deeply  needed.  It  was  not  until  the 
end  of  the  month  that  a  decided  change  for  the  better 
set  in.  In  Jena  and  in  Weimar  wide  sympathy  was 
shown  for  the  sufferer,  and  many  students,  Adlerskron 
in  particular,  offered  to  help  in  nursing  and  in  night- 
watching.  The  duke  sent  a  present  of  wine.  Schiller 
on  February  2 2d  still  felt  pain  and  tightness  at  the 


3IO  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

chest,  and  he  despaired  of  ever  getting  wholly  cured 
of  the  disease ;  his  strength  came  back  very  slowly 
indeed. 

"  I  had  excellent  nursing,"  he  tells  Ktirner,  "  and  it 
lessened  the  weariness  of  being  ill  not  a  Uttle,  to  see 
such  attention  and  such  active  sympathy  shown  toward 
me  by  my  hsteners  and  friends ;  they  disputed  among 
themselves  as  to  who  should  watch  at  my  bedside, 
some  staying  there  three  times  in  the  week."  There 
could  be  no  thought  of  continuing  his  lectures ;  as  soon 
as  health  allowed  it,  he  would  go  to  Eudolstadt  and 
quietly  make  progress  with  the  "  Thirty  Years'  War." 
When  winter  came,  he  proposed  to  deliver  a  course  of 
aesthetic  lectures,  more  in  the  form  of  conversations, 
at  his  own  house.  As  the  patient's  state  forbade  all 
exertion  of  speaking  or  thinking,  means  were  sought 
to  drive  away  ermui,  and  cards  proved  a  gieat  resource. 
Not  being  able  to  sleep  until  a  late  hour,  he  used  to 
spend  half  the  night  in  play,  the  servants  sometimes 
joining  in  the  game.  There  was  a  preface  to  be  written 
for  the  new  volume  of  the  "Memoirs,"  to  which 
Schiller  gave  no  great  pains ;  for  the  three  following 
years  of  his  history  of  the  French  disturbances  pre- 
vious to  the  reign  of  Henry  IV.,  he  took  his  materials 
mainly  from  Anquetil's  "  L'Esprit  de  la  Ligue." 

Just  as  he  fell  ill,  the  critique  of  Biirger's  poems 
had  appeared,  and  many  spoke  of  it  in  Weimar,  not 
knowing,  not  even  imagining,  that  he  was  its  author. 
Goethe  had  declared  that  he  would  be  pleased  to  have 
written  it;  and  since  then  it  was  universally  counted 
excellent.  During  convalescence,  besides  working  at 
the  "  Thirty  Years'  War,"  Schiller  read  Kant's  "  Critique 
of  the  Judgment,"  and  its  lucid  and  thoughtful  contents 
so  absorbed  him,  that  he  felt  wishful  to  make  thorough 
study  of  the  writer's  philosophy.  Before  going  to 
Eudolstadt,  on  2d  April,  he  had  the  painful  and  dif- 
ficult task  of  sending  Burger  a  rejoinder.     The  latter. 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  311 

in  a  so-called  "  preliminary  counter-criticism "  that 
appeared  in  the  Literatur  Zeitung,  expressed  his 
amusement  at  hearing  people  term  the  review  of  his 
poems  a  masterpiece,  assuredly  written  by  none  but  a 
Schiller.  Yet,  said  he,  no  craftsman,  no  really  prac- 
tised man  of  letters,  could  have  indulged  in  theories  so 
empty  and  so  fantastic ;  though  securely  masked,  he 
doubted  not  but  that  the  writer  would  find  courage 
sufficient  to  lift  his  visor.  All  this  was  very  agitating 
to  Schiller ;  and  he  was  specially  anxious  to  show  the 
groundlessness  of  some  of  Burger's  counter-charges. 
By  way  of  proving  that  those  qualities  of  ripeness  and 
sustained  excellence  which  he  asked  for  in  a  poet  were 
not  be3''ond  the  pale  of  human  attainment,  he  quoted 
as  examples,  Wieland,  Goethe,  Geszner,  Lessing,  and 
others  too  of  lesser  fame. 

At  Eudolstadt  every  means  was  tried  to  raise  the 
sufferer's  spirits  and  bring  him  back  to  health ;  he  took 
horse  exercise,  now,  three  or  four  times  in  the  week. 
Curiously  enough,  the  literary  work  to  which  he  now 
turned  was  the  metrical  translation,  originally  begun  in 
competition  with  Burger,  of  the  second  book  of  the 
^neid.  This  for  some  time  had  been  left  un- 
touched, but  now  he  completed  thirty  stanzas  or  more 
of  it,  besides  writing  a  lyric ;  he  thought,  too,  of  com- 
posing a  "  Hymn  to  Light."  Though  still  troubled 
with  chest  pains  and  the  fear  that  his  malady  might 
again  assail  him,  he  kept  as  cheerful  as  ever.  "  I  shall 
not  want  for  courage,  even  if  the  worst  come  to  the 
worst,"  he  says  in  a  letter  to  Korner.  Yet  this  was 
but  a  momentary  struggle  against  losing  heart ;  he 
was  really  overwhelmed  with  anguish  at  the  thought 
of  leaving  Lotte  alone,  and  of  being  hindered  from  full 
use  of  his  poetic  powers.  On  the  8th  of  May  he  had 
an  attack,  more  violent  than  any,  and  this  was  followed 
two  days  later  by  one  of  such  severity  that  suffocation 
seemed  certain.     Unable  to  speak,  he  wrote  on  a  paper 


312  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

a  short  sentence  in  farewell  to  those  around :  "  Take 
care  of  health  !  without  this,  one  can  never  he  at  ease  ! " 
He  also  sent  a  few  words  to  Korner.  Doctor  Stark, 
his  physician,  was  summoned  from  Jena  that  night, 
who,  on  arriving,  found  the  patient  somewhat  hetter. 
He  calmed  Schiller  with  the  assurance  that  his  lungs 
were  not  affected,  the  suffering  being  caused  by  cramp 
in  the  bowels  and  diaphragm. 

But  if  the  more  fearful  attacks  kept  off,  the  patient 
was  still  seized  by  spasms,  to  relieve  which  he  made 
great  use  of  opium ;  there  was,  besides,  an  ever-increas- 
ing loss  of  strength.  Lotte,  though  in  dreadful  distress, 
fought  bravely  to  conceal  her  grief,  knowing  that 
Schiller  took  pleasure  in  seeing  her  mirthful  and 
"  archly  playing  the  little  coquette."  His  young  student 
friends  at  Jena  were  in  deep  consternation  at  the  grave 
news  of  his  illness.  Adlerskron  hastened  to  Eudol- 
stadt  to  nurse  the  patient  and  to  help  in  amusing  him ; 
he  did  this  with  loving  and  tender  care.  The  sisters 
named  him  "  The  Satellite."  He  grew  passionately 
fond  of  Caroline ;  her  own  impulsive  nature  and  her 
warm  affection  for  Schiller  strengthened  this  attach- 
ment. But  circumstances  unluckily  would  not  let  him 
make  longer  stay  in  Jena;  he  went  thence  to  Stutt- 
gart, and  on  the  26th  of  May  entered  the  Karlsacad- 
emie.  Erhard  came  to  Rudolstadt,  where  he  passed 
some  delightful  days ;  Eeiuhold  and  Goeschen  were 
also  there  at  the  same  time  as  he. 

By  the  21st  Schiller  had  already  written  to  Goeschen 
about  a  fresh  edition  of  his  "  Don  Carlos,"  smaller  in 
bulk,  and  to  be  published  during  the  coming  year. 
Three  days  later  he  tells  Korner  that  he  has  nearly 
recovered  health,  though  the  racking  pain  in  the  right 
side  of  his  chest  still  continues.  "  What  may  come  of 
this,  I  cannot  say ;  but  I  am  less  afraid  than  I  was 
four  weeks  ago.  For  the  rest,  this  fearful  attack  has 
done  me  much  good,  morally ;  I  have,  through  it,  been 


THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER  313 

made  to  look  death  more  than  once  in  the  face ;  and 
my  courage  has  thus  been  strengthened.  .  .  .  My  spirit 
was  untroubled ;  and  all  the  pain  that  I  felt  at  that 
moment  was  caused  by  the  thought  of  my  darling 
Lotte,  and  that  she  would  never  have  got  over  the 
blow."  Korner  urged  him  to  take  care  of  himself, 
and  to  spare  no  expense  for  the  recovery  of  health. 
Goeschen,  he  said,  had  told  him  that  he  kept  over 
a  thousand  thalers  every  year  at  Schiller's  disposal, 
even  though  he  should  not  furnish  the  two  volumes 
stipulated  for.  A  few  sheets  would  suffice  for  the 
Ladies'  Calendar.  As  to  going  to  the  baths,  the  doctor 
had  to  decide  that  —  not  the  minister  of  finance.  "  My 
financial  position,"  adds  Korner,  "  is  now  better  than  of 
yore ;  and  if  you  won't  make  use  of  Goeschen,  why, 
I'm  there  to  devise  ways  and  means."  And  again  he 
earnestly  begs  Schiller  to  accept  his  offer.  But  the 
sufferer  was  still  so  enfeebled,  that  for  the  first  there 
could  be  no  thought  of  travelling;  a  httle  drive  even 
had  had  its  harmful  consequences.  Lotte,  on  the  12th 
of  June,  speaks  of  another  violent  attack  of  cramp, 
though  this  did  not  last  so  long.  The  papers  had 
already  announced  the  poet's  death ;  and  the  shocking 
rumour  reached  Solitude  also.  Baggesen,  in  Denmark, 
was  preparing  with  Count  Schimmelmann  to  hold  a 
festival  in  Schiller's  honour,  when  the  news  came  that 
turned  all  their  mirth  to  mourning. 

Another  of  the  poet's  student  friends,  Karl  Grasz, 
hastened  to  his  bedside  on  returning  from  Switzerland, 
and  stayed  faithfully  with  him  in  these  dark  days  of 
suffering.  Four  years  later  Grasz  wrote  :  "  Every  single 
moment  of  that  time  stands  clear  and  plain  before  me. 
How  and  what  we  read  to  you,  sitting  on  the  bed  ;  how 
we  showed  you  the  landscape  in  the  moonlight ;  then, 
again,  how  your  wife  knelt  by  the  bed,  hiding  her  tears 
as  your  arms  enfolded  her ;  how  she  drank  with  me  to 
our  next  happier  meeting;  all  this,  all  that  you  said 


314  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

to  me  aud  that  I  felt,  seems  just  as  fresh  in  my  mem- 
ory as  had  it  happened  yesterday."  And  again,  after 
the  poet's  death,  he  calls  back  another  never-to-be-for- 
gotten scene  to  Lotte's  mind.  "  I  was  in  liis  room,  and, 
as  I  stood  at  the  window,  reading,  the  sufferer's  fea- 
tures in  all  their  greatness  and  nobleness  became  deeply 
fixed  in  my  memory.  He  had,  if  I  mistake  not,  taken 
some  opium  to  still  the  violent  spasms,  and  he  lay  there, 
lightly  sleeping,  as  some  marble  statue.  You  were  in 
the  side-room,  where  I  had  been  reading  his  ^ueid 
translation  to  you ;  and  at  times  you  came  to  the  door 
to  watch  if  he  should  want  you.  Seeing  him  lie  there, 
you  gently  approached  and  knelt  down  with  folded 
hands  at  his  bed.  All  your  dark  hair  fell  loosely  over 
your  shoulders,  as  the  tears  came  into  your  eyes.  You 
had  scarcely  noticed  that  any  one  was  in  the  room. 
Then  the  fainting  sufferer  awoke,  when,  seeing  you,  he 
passionately  threw  his  arms  about  your  head,  and  so  lay 
resting  on  your  neck  as  strength  again  went  from  him." 

On  July  3d  Hardenberg  also  went  to  Rudolstadt, 
whom  Grasz  had  got  to  know  shortly  before.  He 
brought  the  poet  letters  from  Grasz  and  Professor 
Schmidt.  The  latter  begged  him  in  the  name  of 
Hardenberg's  father  to  make  the  young  man  take 
serious  interest  in  the  study  of  law%  and  to  help  in 
thoroughly  preparing  him  for  a  commercial  career, 
which  should  be  of  benefit  to  him  and  to  his  family. 
And  Schiller  did  this  so  kindly,  so  persuasively,  that 
the  young  would-be  poet  recognised  obedience  to  his 
father  as  a  solemn  duty,  and  determined  to '  spend  all 
his  energies  upon  work  which  he  certainly  found 
distasteful. 

Schiller's  health  had  soon  so  far  mended  that  by  the 
9th  of  July  he  was  able  to  start  for  Karlsbad  with  his 
wife  and  her  sister.  At  Eger  he  visited  the  town  hall 
and  saw  there  a  portrait  of  Wallenstein  and  Pachhii- 
bel's  house,  where  the  great  general  fell.     His  life  at 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  315 

the  baths  was  very  secluded,  yet  he  liked  the  society 
of  some  Austrian  officers  of  mark,  who  gave  him  an 
insight  into  military  life.  The  Countess  Lanthieri  von 
Wagensberg,  of  Gratz,  who  knew  Goethe  intimately, 
took  great  interest  in  the  poet.  Recovery  was  very 
tedious.  It  was  impossible  for  him  to  tliink  of  work ; 
but  still  he  could  meditate  upon  the  way  to  continue 
his  "  Ghostseer,"  that  should  be  worked  out  on  a  larger 
scale.  Unfortunately,  his  cure  was  interrupted  all  too 
soon,  as  Lotte  could  not  be  absent  from  the  festivities 
at  Eudolstadt  on  the  5th  of  August,  when  the  newly 
married  hereditary  prince  was  to  enter  the  town.  So, 
to  complete  his  cure,  Schiller  went  on  to  Erfurt,  which 
already  at  Easter  he  had  wanted  to  visit.  Here  he 
stayed  at  No.  36  Langebriicke,  in  Widow  Beyer's  house, 
and  there,  on  a  pane  in  the  little  bow-windowed  room 
of  the  first  floor,  his  name  will  be  found  written.  At 
this  time  he  took  the  Eger  waters,  and  they  did  him 
much  good.  Talks  with  the  Koadjutor,  whom  he  visited 
each  evening,  formed  his  pleasant  amusement.  Friiu- 
lein  von  Dacheroden,  now  Frau  von  Humboldt,  was 
travelling  with  her  husband ;  but  to  Schiller's  delight 
he  met  his  old  friend  Wilhelm  von  Wolzogen.  Caro- 
line also  came  to  Erfurt.  Without  great  effort  he 
could  manage  to  spend  five  hours  daily  in  dictating  his 
"  Thirty  Years'  War,"  so  as  to  complete  the  requisite 
amount  of  "  copy."  He  also  swiftly  revised  his  version 
in  iambics  of  the  "  Don  Carlos,"  as,  at  the  Koadjutor's 
wish,  some  Weimar  players,  now  in  Erfurt,  were  to 
give  a  performance  of  the  piece.  They  were  members 
of  a  company  under  Goethe's  own  direction,  and  they 
asked  leave  to  act  the  play  in  Weimar  also.  There 
was  quite  a  contest  among  them  for  the  parts,  and  one 
actor  refused  the  role  of  Domingo,  as  he  had  no  longer 
any  inclination  to  play  villains'  parts.  "  Fiesco  "  was 
given  on  the  following  night  by  another  company,  the 
"  National  Gesellschaft." 


3i6  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

This  year  of  illness  had  been  a  very  expensive  one 
for  Schiller,  and  his  uncertain  position  caused  him  great 
anxiety.  Besides  an  old  debt  of  ninety  thalers  and 
120  more  paid  by  him  as  surety  for  another,  he  had 
spent  fourteen  hundred  thalers ;  and  now  that  his 
health  was  so  broken,  the  prospects  of  making  a  live- 
lihood seemed  less  and  less  hopeful.  The  Koadjutor 
was  unable  himself  to  give  pecuniary  help,  but,  acting 
on  his  advice,  Schiller  applied  to  the  duke  for  a  stipend 
upon  which  he  might  count  in  extremity.  Should  this 
request  prove  unsuccessful,  if  driven  to  it,  he  would 
seek  his  fortune  either  in  Mainz,  in  Vienna,  Gottingen, 
or  Berlin.  The  duke,  shortly  before  leaving,  sent 
Lotte  250  thalers,  assuring  her  that  if  in  a  year  her 
husband  were  still  unable  to  work,  he  would  think 
over  some  means  to  help  them.  As  Schiller  in  his 
suffering  state  found  residence  in  a  strange  place  both 
uncomfortable  and  costly,  as,  too,  he  longed  to  be  back 
among  his  Jena  friends,  on  the  1st  of  October  he  set 
out  for  his  dear  home.  Korner  had  just  then  sent  him 
news  of  the  birth  of  a  son,  and  Lotte  was  among  the 
sponsors  of  him  who  afterward  wrote  "  Lyre  and 
Sword." 


CHAPTEE  III. 

FROM  OCTOBER,  1791,  TO  AUGUST,  1793. 

Already  when  at  Erfurt  Lotte  had  asked  an  old 
friend  of  her  childhood,  Fritz  von  Stein,  who  was 
studying  in  Jena,  to  come  and  stay  with  them,  offer- 
ing him  the  vacant  room  in  her  house ;  for  Schiller 
was  now  obliged  to  live  in  the  larger  one  that  last 
winter  had  remained  unoccupied.  She  also  invited 
Stein  to  dine  at  their  table.  He  had  first  arranged  to 
have  his  meals  with  some  other  Jena  students,  Johann 
Carl  von  Eichard,  Magister  Gciritz  of  Wiu-temberg,  and 
Bartolomaus  Fischenich  of  Bonn.  But,  as  Fritz  liked 
to  be  always  with  Schiller,  liis  companions  proposed 
that  they,  too,  might  be  allowed  to  board  with  the 
poet.  So  during  meal-time  the  sick  man  was  fortunate 
in  always  having  society  both  amusing  and  intellectual. 
Goritz,  it  is  true,  had  no  remarkable  talent,  and  Fichard, 
destined  for  a  diplomatic  career,  was  not  yet  past  the 
raw  stage  ;  but  Fritz  von  Stein's  fresh  and  noble  nature 
had  got  breadth  from  contact  with  Goethe,  while  Fische- 
nich delighted  in  philosophy,  and  especially  in  Kant, 
whom  he  had  thoroughly  studied.  And  if  their  some- 
what frugal  meal  was  often  disturbed  by  Schiller's 
illness,  still  the  young  fellows  felt  the  better  for  asso- 
ciating with  one  so  witty,  so  courteous,  and  so  good- 
humoured.  On  most  occasions  the .  poet  let  others 
talk,  remaining  silent  himself,  but  at  times  he  would 
lead  the  fun  and  pleasantry,  and  when  some  subject 
seized  his  interest,  he  spoke  with  great  eloquence  and 

317 


3i8  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

warmth.  In  his  presence  no  one  could  feel  constraint ; 
on  days  when  he  was  better,  all  were  as  merry  as  the 
merriest  of  students.  But  he  was  often  exhausted  and 
depressed  by  pain,  and  his  companions  strove  to  do  all 
that  was  possible  for  his  amusement.  Thus  they  spent 
many  an  afternoon  at  cards,  of  which  Schiller  was  very 
fond.  Fischenich,  soon  after  leaving  Jena,  wrote : 
"  When  shall  we  be  joking  together  again  over  some 
merry  meal  ?  When  again  shall  I  he  down  when 
Schiller  lies  down  and  awake  when  he  awakes  ? " 
Lotte's  letter  to  Fritz  shows  us  something  of  their 
raillery  and  banter.  "  Fichard,  who  is  just  here  read- 
ing, wishes  particularly  to  be  remembered  to  you.  He 
sleeps  comme  a  Vordinaire,  and  chatters  just  about  the 
same.  Fischenich  and  we  have  lately  guessed  the 
reason  for  his  having  struck  up  such  hearty  friendship 
with  you  when  he  was  here;  for,  after  all,  there  are 
not  many  points  of  resemblance  between  your  char- 
acter and  his.  First,  it's  because  of  your  rank  and 
because  you're  at  the  court,  and  he  has  such  a  liking 
for  courts.  Fischenich  is  also  well,  and  pares  his  nails 
zealously.  It  strikes  us  that  on  the  strength  of  this 
accomplishment  he  might  travel  about,  and  offer  his 
services  just  as  dentists  do.  Ladies  would  soon  think 
it  as  indispensable  to  have  pretty  nails  as  pretty  teeth." 
Once  even  the  fun  went  so  far,  that  blowing  soap- 
bubbles  formed  their  general  amusement.  Then,  again, 
there  were  very  sad  and  gloomy  times,  clouded  by  the 
poet's  suffering.  Yet  his  illness  did  not  keep  him 
from  taking  part  at  the  social  meetings  of  two  friends 
—  probably  Eeinhold  and  Paulus  —  nor  from  inviting 
three  or  four  persons  twice  in  the  week  to  have  tea 
with  him.  He  looked  upon  these  little  distractions  as 
necessary  to  his  health.  To  get  the  air  and  exercise 
he  needed,  he  would  have  liked  a  carriage ;  but,  un- 
fortunately, this  \vish  had  to  be  given  up. 

Cheerful  society  and  his  bent  for  occupation  "  that 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  319 

never  wearies,"  made  Schiller  at  times  forget  his  dis- 
tressful state.  The  performance  of  "  Don  Carlos  "  at 
Erfurt  had  suggested  several  alterations  to  him  that 
he  vdshed  to  make  before  the  play  was  given  at  Wei- 
mar. For  this  purpose  Wieland  should  ask  Goethe  to 
allow  him  six  weeks'  time.  And  though  Goethe  was 
averse  to  such  postponement  and  to  the  altering  of 
parts  already  learned  and  in  rehearsal,  he  still  con- 
sented to  put  off  the  performance  until  the  last  day 
of  the  year.  Nevertheless,  it  did  not  take  place  before 
the  end  of  February.  Schiller  promised  to  send  Cru- 
sius  at  Easter  the  first  volume  of  his  shorter  prose 
essays,  which  he  was  now  engaged  in  revising.  But 
there  was  the  continuation  of  the  Tlialia  to  be  thought 
of,  too.  Therefore  he  again  began  to  work  at  the  ^neid 
translation,  and  with  such  swift  success,  that,  to  his  de- 
light, the  103  strophes  needed  to  finish  it  were  written 
in  nine  days.  He  now  intended  to  set  about  trans- 
lating the  "  Agamemnon,"  which,  besides  being  a  supple- 
ment to  the  Tlialia,  should  form  the  first  volume  of 
his  "  Greek  Dramas,"  and  should  give  him  completer 
mastery  of  the  classic  style.  The  ease  with  which  he 
had  translated  Virgil's  lines  led  him  again  to  think  of 
writing  an  epic,  for  which  this  metre  seemed  to  him 
most  fit.  Korner  wished  him  to  choose  a  subject  not 
merely  of  national,  but  of  world-wide  interest,  where 
to  philosophy  he  could  join  brilliance  of  description 
and  splendour  of  language.  But  a  national  theme 
could  alone  rouse  Schiller's  enthusiasm,  and  as  in  the 
late  King  of  Prussia's  character  there  was  little  to 
inspire  afi'ection,  he  felt  drawn  to  another  monarch,  to 
Gustav  Adolph,  round  whose  figure  centred  interest 
both  national,  political,  and  romantic.  Yet  in  this 
suffering  state,  and  with  so  much  to  weigh  upon  his 
mind,  it  was  impossible  to  begin  a  poem.  Schiller 
thought  of  making  the  Tlialia  an  important  source  of 
income,  as  Goeschen  was  to  issue  a  number  every  two 


320  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

months.     Next   year  the  title  would   be  changed  to 
the  New  Thalia.     Besides,  the  "  Memoirs,"  translations 
for  which  he  only  wrote  the  preface,  should  also  be  a 
means  of  earning  money.     In  October  he  had  become 
acquainted  with   Friedrich  Immanuel  Niethammer,  a 
clever  young  student  of  theology  at  Jena,  and  whom 
circumstances  had  forced  to  take  to  Uterature.    To  him 
Schiller  entrusted  the  translation  of  Vertot's  "  History 
of  the  Maltese  Order,"  and  De  Garsault's  version  of 
Pitaval's  "  Eemarkable  Lawsuits."       Niethammer  also 
undertook  the  correction  of  the  TJialia  proofs.      He 
joined  those   who  sat  now  at  Schiller's  table  in  the 
evenings.     As  a  thorough  disciple  of  Kant,  Nietham- 
mer took  a  vigorous  part  in  philosophical  discussions. 
With  him  and  Fischenich  the  poet  was  able  to  speak 
upon  the  subject  of  tragedy,  which  now  engaged  him  ; 
for  since  the  past  December  he  had  been  working  at  an 
essay  "  Upon  the  Cause  of  Pleasure  in  Things  Tragic." 
But  spasms  and  difficulty  in  breathing  made  life  a 
torture,  and  Lotte  was  ever  racked  by  the  dread  of  los- 
ing her  darling  husband.     Then,  all  at  once,  their  care 
was    changed  into  rejoicing.       Baggesen  had   written 
about  the  funeral  celebration  at  Hellebek  to  Keinhold, 
who,    in    answer,   said    that    Schiller    might    possibly 
recover  if  he  were  not  teased  by  pecuniary  troubles. 
"  We  have  both  of  us  two  hundred  thalers,  and  if  we 
fall  ill  we  don't  know  whether  to  spend  them  over  the 
kitchen  or  at  the  chemist's."     Baggesen  read  out  this 
extract  to  the  hereditary  prince,  Frederick  Christian 
of  Schleswig  Holstein  von  Augustenburg,  whose  early 
prejudices  against  Schiller  had  been  changed  by  the 
"  Don  Carlos  "  into  warm  sympathy.     When  at  Karls- 
bad, Korner's  sister-in-law  had  given  him  nearer  details 
of  the  poet's  suffering  condition,  and  the  prince  resolved 
to  come  to  his  aid.      After  due  deliberation  he  com- 
missioned Baggesen  to  ask  the  minister.  Count  Ernst 
Heinrich  von  Schimmelmann,  whether  during  a  course 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  321 

of  years  he  would  contribute  something  toward  Schil- 
ler's support.  Schiinmelmann,  the  poet's  senior  by- 
twelve  years,  was  born  in  Dresden,  where  his  father,  a 
native  of  Pomerania,  had  acquired  a  large  fortune 
during  the  Seven  Years'  War,  thus  setting  the  basis  to 
the  wealth  and  rank  which  came  to  him  later.  On 
27th  November,  in  a  letter  full  of  delicacy  and  kindly 
feeling,  the  hereditary  prince  and  Count  von  Schim- 
melmann  made  Schiller  the  joint  offer  of  a  thousand 
thalers  per  annum  for  three  years,  so  that  he  might 
obtain  that  rest  so  needed  for  his  recovery.  "  Accept 
this  gift,  noble  man ! "  they  wrote,  "  do  not  let  our 
rank  incline  you  to  refuse  it ;  we  know  what  value  to 
set  upon  that.  We  are  proud  of  nothing  save  of  being 
men,  citizens  of  the  great  republic  that  includes  more 
than  the  hves  of  a  single  generation,  more  than  the 
confines  of  a  single  globe.  They  are  but  men,  they 
are  but  brothers  that  here  speak  to  you  —  not  the 
vain,  not  the  gxeat,  who  by  such  use  of  their  wealth 
only  indulge  in  a  somewhat  higher  form  of  arrogance." 
They  would  gladly  see  him  established  at  Copenhagen, 
the  great  capital  and  seat  of  commerce,  where  they 
would  not  be  the  only  ones  to  know  and  love  him ; 
and,  when  he  had  regained  health,  a  government  post 
there  should  not  be  lacking  to  him  ;  yet  they  were  not 
so  selfish,  they  said,  as  to  make  these  the  conditions 
upon  which  their  gift  should  be  accepted.  The  letter 
was  sent  through  Baggesen  to  Eeinhold,  who  came 
with  it  to  his  suffering  friend  like  some  rescuing  angel. 
In  truth,  it  was  a  new  birthday  for  Schiller.  He  at 
once  wrote  the  joyful  news  to  his  friend  Kcirner. 
"  That  for  which  all  my  hfe  I  have  ardently  longed  is 
now  come  to  pass,"  he  said, "  I  am  freed  for  a  long 
time,  perhaps  for  ever,  from  all  care  ;  I  have  got  the 
long-wished-for  independence  of  mind.  ...  At  length 
I  have  leisure  in  which  to  learn,  to  collect  knowledge, 
and  to  work  for  all  time.     Within  three  years  I  can 


322  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

find  an  appointment  in  Denmark,  or  perhaps  there  will 
be  some  opening  at  Mainz,  and  then  I  am  set  up  for 
life."  To  settle  himself  in  Cogenhagen  was  not  expe- 
dient, he  said,  seeing  that  his  relations  with  the  Duke 
of  Weimar  were  as  yet  so  new ;  but  he  meant  to  travel 
thither  in  a  year  or  so.  Three  days  after  this  letter  he 
sent  Baggesen  his  warmest  thanks.  Ever  since  he  had 
learned  to  appreciate  freedom  of  mind,  he  had  been 
doomed  to  forego  its  enjoyment.  A  rash  step  had 
forced  him  to  make  a  hving  by  literature  while  still 
inexperienced,  and  before  his  powers  were  ripe.  He 
had  paid  the  price  of  those  ten  years  of  struggle  and 
effort  to  earn  his  bread  while  yet  doing  honour  to  his 
art.  He  had  paid  it  with  his  health.  "  Interest  in  my 
work,  a  few  fair  flowers  strewn  across  my  life's  path 
by  fate,  kept  me  from  perceiving  my  loss  until  as  this 
year  began  —  you  know  how  ?  —  I  awoke  from  my 
dream.  At  a  time  when  hfe  had  begun  to  show  me 
all  its  worth,  death  approached  me.  The  danger,  it  is 
true,  passed  over,  but  I  only  awoke  to  a  fresh  exist- 
ence, and,  with  weakened  powers,  to  renew  my  fight 
with  Fate.  In  such  a  state  the  letters  from  Denmark 
found  me."  Three  days  after  this  he  sent  thanks  to 
the  generous  givers.  "  I  have  to  pay  my  debt,  not 
to  you  but  to  mankind,"  he  wrote ;  "  that  is  the  com- 
mon altar  where  you  lay  down  your  gifts,  and  I,  my 
gratitude." 

Besides  giving  care  to  his  health  and  attention  to 
work  which  needed  completion,  he  felt  that  his  next 
duty  was  thoroughly  to  study  the  Kantian  philosophy, 
even  though  he  spent  the  whole  three  years  in  doing 
this ;  for  he  was  deeply  conscious  of  liis  great  need  of 
a  sound  philosophical  training.  On  the  16th,  already, 
he  ordered  a  copy  of  the  "  Critique  of  Pure  Reason," 
together  with  Garves's  "  Miscellaneous  Writings."  He 
also  intended  to  read  Hume,  Locke,  and  Leibnitz, 
Kant's  predecessors.     At  Christmas  he  was  gladdened 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  323 

by  a  visit  from  his  devoted  pupil,  Hardenberg,  and  the 
new  year,  1792,  opened  happily.  Though  far  from 
having  regained  health,  his  brain  was  still  perfectly 
clear,  and  there  was  little  to  hinder  literary  work. 
For  the  Tlialia,  an  essay  "  On  the  Tragic  Art "  had 
been  finished,  "  The  Ghostseer  "  was  to  be  revised,  and 
he  intended  going  on  with  the  "  Thirty  Years'  War," 
forgetting,  maybe,  amid  these  plans,  that  the  alter- 
ations to  be  made  in  "  Don  Carlos "  would  probably 
take  up  two  months  of  his  time. 

At  the  beginning  of  January  he  was  bled,  a  remedy 
to  which  he  ever  afterward  had  recourse.  Nevertheless, 
there  came  a  severe  attack  on  the  19th,  yet  he  quickly 
recovered  from  it.  Bad  weather  and  extreme  cold  unfor- 
tunately prevented  him  from  taldng  all  the  exercise 
his  health  required,  though  he  passed  the  time 
pleasantly  enough  in  working  and  in  seeing  friends. 
The  gift  from  Copenhagen  permitted  him  to  pay  off  all 
debts  this  year,  except  the  amount  advanced  to  him  by 
Korner,  which  without  pinching  could  be  restored, 
later.  To  his  question  about  Beit's  bill,  Korner  sur- 
prised him  by  the  news  that  he  had  discharged  it  long 
ago.  Schiller  was  to  let  the  matter  rest  if  other  and 
more  pressing  claims  needed  settling.  "  I  think  we 
understand  one  another  upon  this  head,"  adds  Korner 
in  his  generous,  true-hearted  way.  However,  Schiller 
managed  to  refund  his  friend  in  full  for  the  sum 
paid  to  Beit.  Prefaces  had  to  be  written  against  the 
Easter  Book  Fair  for  two  volumes  of  translations,  while 
the  introduction  to  a  volume  of  the  "  Memoirs  "  must 
be  continued.  Progress  had  also  to  be  made  with  his 
"  Thirty  Years'  War,"  while  he  meditated  working  at 
"  something  more  sensible,"  something  of  which  he  will 
speak  to  Korner  by  mouth.  This  was  a  tragedy  in  the 
Greek  manner,  with  choruses  suggested  by  Vertot's 
book  on  the  Maltese,  and  from  it  there  shaped  itself  the 
mighty  drama  "  Wallenstein."     "  I  am  and  I  remain 


324  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

but  a  poet,  and  as  a  poet  I  shall  die."     He  had  written 
thus  to  Korner  shortly  before. 

While  waiting  with  impatience  for  the  milder  season 
to  come  on,  when  he  and  Lotte  would  visit  Korner,  Schil- 
ler hired  a  horse,  but  the  terribly  cold  weather  kept  him 
from  making  any  use  of  it.  Indeed  the  dreadful  cramps 
again  attacked  him,  and  his  journey  had  continually 
to  be  postponed.  It  was  not  until  about  the  10th  of 
April  that  he  could  start,  when,  with  Lotte,  Fischenich, 
and  two  servants,  he  drove  to  Dresden,  staying  at 
Kcirner's  house  there.  The  friends  had,  of  course, 
much  to  tell  each  other.  Schiller  spoke  of  his  pro- 
jected tragedy  and  of  the  issue  of  a  compendious  journal, 
for  which  the  leading  men  in  hterature  should  write. 
The  principles  of  aesthetics  formed  another  subject  for 
discussion,  as  well  as  the  efficacy  of  magnetism  with 
regard  to  the  poet's  malady.  Schiller  was  glad  to 
make  the  acquaintance  of  Count  Geszler,  the  Prussian 
ambassador,  one  of  Kcirner's  friends. 

He  also  met  young  Friedrich  Schlegel,  then  spending 
the  vacation  with  his  sister.  If  in  Leipzig  he  affected 
to  study  art  and  philosophy,  it  did  not  keep  him  from 
leading  a  raki.sh  life ;  and  his  presumption,  his  insta- 
bility, and  want  of  character  made  a  most  disagreeable 
impression  upon  Schiller.  As  he  was  for  ever  asking 
questions,  they  dubbed  him  "the  querist."  These 
three  weeks  which  the  two  friends  could  spend  to- 
gether were  sadly  interrupted  by  the  illness  of  the 
one  and  by  the  business  engagements  of  the  other,  yet 
they  had  met  this  time  with  more  affection  than 
before,  and  had  been  able  to  enjoy  many  a  tranquil, 
pleasant  hour.  Unfortunately,  their  friendly  feeling 
toward  Huber  was  growing  weaker,  for  he  not  only 
chose  to  prolong,  in  a  most  unaccountable  way,  his 
lengthy  engagement  to  Dora,  but  from  the  tone  of  his 
letters  he  gave  her  to  understand  that  all  his  love  was 
extinct.     It  was  only  as  editor  that  Schiller  had  had 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  325 

relations  with  him,  Huber  having  contributed  essays  to 
the  "  Memoirs  "  and  to  TJialia. 

At  Leipzig,  also,  whither  Fischenich  accompanied 
him,  the  poet  was  seized  by  a  fit  of  spasms ;  but  when 
in  Jena  he  felt  so  much  better  that  he  could  join  his 
young  friends  in  a  game  at  bowls.  They  played  in 
Fichard's  garden,  and  from  time  to  time  he  fell  into 
merry  dispute  with  Fritz  von  Stein.  Goritz  had  a 
title  written  out  by  Schiller  which  ran  as  follows: 
"  Treatise  upon  the  Ai^t  of  Boids,  hy  Friedridi  von  Stein, 
Chamberlain  to  the  Ducal  Houses  of  Saxony  and 
Weimar,  '  Brodhusar '  and '  JCummeltiirken,'  "  these  last 
being  humourous  names  given  to  those  students  whose 
homes  were  not  far  from  Jena.  This  time  Schiller 
gave  no  lectures.  He  was  working,  and  with  such 
ease,  at  the  "  Thirty  Years'  War,"  that  in  six  hours  of 
each  day,  two  of  these  spent  in  revising,  he  could  write 
a  quarter  of  a  sheet  —  that  is,  four  pages.  This  was 
certainly  a  strange  way  of  giving  his  brain  rest.  But 
Schdler  with  his  merry  disposition  found  it  unusually 
hard  to  rest,  and  he  often  neglected  to  obey  the 
physician's  orders,  which,  of  course,  increased  his 
malady.  For  the  Esthetic  Letters,  planned  with 
Kcirner,  he  read  Kant's  "  Critique  of  Seasoning  Power  ; " 
he  also  intended  to  master  Baumgarten's  work  on 
Esthetics.  At  the  same  time  he  felt  impatient  to 
do  fresh  work  in  poetry.  "  Wallenstein  "  chiefly  en- 
grossed him,  and  the  "  Hymn  to  Light "  also  took  up 
a  part  of  his  time.  "  It  is  really  only  in  art  that  I  feel 
my  power,"  he  tells  Korner ;  "  in  theorising  I  must  al- 
ways torment  myself  with  principles  ;  there  I  am  only 
a  dilettante.  But  for  practise'  sake  I  like  philoso- 
phising about  theories ;  and  now  criticism  must  itself 
make  amends  to  me  for  the  harm  it  has  done  me. 
And  harmed  me  it  really  has ;  for  the  fearlessness,  the 
hvuig  glow,  that  I  had  before  ever  I  knew  a  single 
rule,  is  wanting  to  me  for  many  years  past.  .  .  .  Yet  if 


326  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

I  get  so  far  that  Art  becomes  Nature  for  me,  just  as 
good  breeding  becomes  habitual  to  a  well-mannered 
man,  then  my  imagination  will  regain  her  former 
freedom." 

Although  the  food  was  ill  suited  to  his  delicate 
health,  for  the  sake  of  company,  Schiller  took  his  meals 
with  the  rest.  He  now  really  managed  to  get  a  car- 
riage, and  in  the  early  part  of  June  drove  to  Erfurt 
with  his  wife.  Although  too  late  to  attend  the  christen- 
ing of  the  Humboldts'  httle  daughter,  he  was  able  to 
greet  these  old  friends.  While  in  Erfurt  he  also  met 
Caroline  von  Beulwitz.  More  bent  than  ever  upon 
getting  a  divorce,  she  had  formed  a  strangely  enthu- 
siastic attachment  for  the  Koadjutor,  in  whom  she  saw 
every  good  and  noble  quality.  While  Lotte  and 
Schiller  were  thus  in  great  concern  about  their  sister 
and  her  difficulties,  she  felt  equally  anxious  on  their 
account,  as  Schiller,  it  was  feared,  could  but  live  few 
years  longer. 

So  far  as  the  ever-recurring  attacks  of  spasms  allowed 
him,  the  poet  worked  on  from  sheer  necessity  at  his 
"  Thirty  Years'  War."  But  he  could  write  nothing  for 
the  next  three  numbers  of  TJialia,  which  proved  very 
weak  ones,  owing  to  the  lack  of  good  contributions. 
On  July  30th  he  complained  of  the  continued  stress  of 
work,  and  that  spasms  still  tormented  him,  so  that  he 
often  hardly  knew  what  to  do.  As  in  such  a  state 
there  could  be  no  thought  of  travelling  home,  he 
invited  his  mother  to  stay  with  him.  To  his  great  de- 
light, she  promised  to  come,  and  to  bring  with  her  his 
youngest  sister,  Nanette.  At  this  time  Schiller's  old 
playmate,  Conz,  visited  him,  who  had  become  a  preacher 
at  the  Karlsacadamie,  but  the  sick  man  was  little  edi- 
fied by  this  meeting. 

On  the  26th  the  French  National  Assembly  conferred 
the  right  of  citizenship  upon  several  foreigners,  whose 
writings    or    whose    views   had    made   them   notable ; 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  327 

among  the  Germans  so  distinguished  were  Campe, 
Pestalozzi,  and  Klopstock.  Later  on,  at  the  request  of 
a  member,  "  le  sieur  Gille,  publiciste  allemand,"  also 
.  obtained  this  honour. 

On  reading  the  announcement  in  the  Moniteitr,  the 
duchess  wrote  to  Frau  von  Stein,  expressing  her  hope 
that  Schiller  would  refuse  the  rights  of  citizenship, 
given  to  him  as  one  of  those  foreigners  who  had 
written  in  support  of  the  Ee volution.  But  he,  as  yet, 
knew  nothing  of  the  whole  matter.  It  was  not  until 
October  that  the  diploma,  together  with  a  copy  of 
the  regulation,  was  in  readiness  to  be  sent  off  to  him. 
However,  he  never  received  it  then ;  and  thus,  unhke 
Klopstock,  had  no  opportunity  of  returning  it. 

To  his  glad  surprise,  mother  and  sister  came  two 
days  sooner  than  he  expected.  He  was  delighted  to 
have  his  beloved  parent  safe  and  well  at  his  side,  and 
to  do  all  that  could  give  her  happiness,  although  it 
must  needs  have  saddened  her  to  find  the  once  strong 
and  healthy  son  changed  to  such  a  picture  of  distress- 
ful suffering.  Nanette,  his  sister,  had  still  all  the 
naturalness  of  a  child.  This  pleased  him ;  and  he 
hoped  that,  under  his  guidance,  she  might  get  the  edu- 
cation which  was  denied  her  at  home.  Fortunately,  he 
had  now  at  last  brought  his  '•  Thirty  Years'  War "  to 
its  close,  and  on  the  21st  he  sent  the  final  pages  to  the 
printer.  "  Now  I  am  free,"  he  writes  to  Korner,  "  and 
I  will  always  remain  so.  No  more  work  shall  be  im- 
posed upon  me  by  others.  Nothing  shall  be  done 
except  out  of  sheer  fondness  or  inchnation.  For  the 
next  week  or  ten  days  I  mean  to  do  nothing,  and  see 
what  perfect  rest  of  the  brain,  fresh  air,  exercise,  and 
society  small-talk  can  do  toward  mending  my  health." 
With  this  end  in  view  he  went  with  his  relations  to 
Eudolstadt,  and  spent  a  merry  time,  although  the  ques- 
tion of  CaroHne's  intended  divorce  was  stUl  a  grief  to 
them  all.     They  came  back  to    Jena  on  the  4th  of 


328  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

October.  Soon  afterward  his  mother  and  sister  left, 
taking  with  them  letters  to  Ehvert  and  Hoveu,  the  old 
friends  of  his  boyhood.  He  promised  to  visit  home  in 
the  coming  year. 

The  lecture  season  being  now  at  hand,  all  hopes  of 
doing  fresh  work  in  poetry  were  balked.  For  he  had 
arranged  to  give  a  series  of  private  lectures  during  the 
winter  upon  aesthetics.  "  I  am  now  up  to  my  ears  in 
Kant's  '  Urtheils  Kraft,'  "  he  tells  Ktirner  on  the  15th. 
"  I  shall  never  rest  until  I  have  fathomed  this,  and 
until  it  grows  to  something  in  my  hands.  It  is  also 
necessary  that  at  all  hazard  I  should  completely  think 
out  and  exhaust  a  lecture,  so  as  to  be  in  a  thorough 
state  of  readiness,  and  easily  able,  moreover,  to  write 
upon  emergency  something  readable  for  the  Tlialia, 
without  spending  either  time  or  pains." 

Of  the  twenty-four  students  who  wished  to  attend 
his  private  lectures,  eighteen  paid  fees.  Thus,  as 
Schiller  put  it,  he  earned  a  hundred  thalers  simply  by 
collecting  for  self-use  a  rich  store  of  thoughts  and  ideas 
that  might  help  him  hereafter  in  producing  some  work 
of  art.  There  were  literary  plans,  besides,  made  partly 
wdth  regard  to  Korner,  who,  disappointed  now,  after 
long  waiting,  of  a  rich  inheritance,  would  have  to  count 
largely  upon  hterature  as  a  means  of  livelihood. 

Meanwhile  the  French,  pushing  onward,  were  at  the 
Ehine.  On  the  14th  Mainz  fell  into  their  hands, 
Mainz,  where,  through  the  Koadjutor's  influence,  our 
poet  had  once  hoped  to  gain  an  agreeable  post.  Frank- 
fort, too,  was  set  in  flames,  and  all  seemed  wavering  in 
the  balance.  It  was  now,  only,  after  the  Allies  had 
been  driven  from  France,  that  Schiller  felt  greater  con- 
fidence in  the  energy  of  the  French,  and  in  their  new 
republic. 

He  eagerly  read  of  the  Convention's  doings  in  the 
Monitcur,  and  herefrom  judged  of  their  weakness  or 
their  strength.     Germany  seemed  bound  to  lose  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  329 

Lhine  provinces,  and  there  was  no  doubt  but  that 
great  limits  would  be  put  to  the  Kurfiirst  of  Mainz's 
power.  "  If  the  French  destroy  my  prospects,"  wrote 
Schiller  in  his  excitement,  "  I  may  feel  inclined  to  go 
to  the  French  themselves  for  better  ones."  He  took 
pleasure  in  continuing  his  lectures  on  aesthetics, 
although  sleepless  nights  often  compelled  him  to 
keep  in  bed  until  noon,  when  he  would  stay  up  until 
long  past  midnight.  He  beheved  he  had  solved  Kant's 
problem  as  to  the  objective  basis  of  taste,  and  in  his  fiery, 
impetuous  way,  was  for  embodying  his  thoughts  in  a 
dialogue  to  be  called  "  Kallias  ;  or.  Of  Beauty."  Fisch- 
enich  had  meanwhile  gone  back  to  Bonn,  and  his  place, 
as  Schiller's  companion,  was  filled  by  the  theologian, 
Magister  Karl  Heinrich  Gros  of  Suabia,  formerly  tutor 
to  the  Prince  of  Wiirtemberg,  but  who,  having  quar- 
relled with  his  pupil,  was  now  come  to  study  law  at 
Jena.  Schiller  spoke  well  of  him  to  Fischenich,  prais- 
ing his  clear  intellect  and  sound  judgment,  and  saying 
that  he  was  particularly  well  versed  in  the  Kantian 
philosophy. 

The  growing  despotism  in  France,  and  particularly 
the  impeachment  of  Louis  Seize,  stirred  Schiller's  feel- 
ings to  such  depth  that  he  determined  to  stand  forth 
publicly  as  the  king's  defender.  Writing  to  Kcirner  on 
the  21st  of  December,  he  says:  "This  undertaking 
seems  to  me  weighty  enough  to  employ  the  pen  of  a 
man  of  sense ;  and  a  German  writer,  who  should  state 
his  views  upon  this  question  with  freedom  and  elo- 
quence, might  possibly  make  some  sort  of  impression 
upon  these  misguided  mortals."  In  such  crises  it 
behooved  one  not  to  remain  indolent  and  inactive. 
Had  every  liberal  thinker  among  men  kept  silence,  no 
steps  would  have  been  taken  toward  human  improve- 
ment ;  it  was  just  in  times  like  these  that  one  ought  to 
speak  out.  Nor  would  he  omit  to  blame  the  "  brutal- 
ity" of   German   governments,  and  in  doing  this  he 


330  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

would  refer  to  the  more  liberal  feeling  which  prevailed 
in  Weimar.  Through  the  Duke  of  Weimar's  influence 
he  hoped  to  circulate  many  copies  of  his  book  in  Paris, 
and  Zacharias  Becker  was  already  engaged  to  translate 
it  into  French  ;  but  the  matter  must  for  a  time  be  kept 
secret.  However,  Schiller  turned  ill  over  his  work ; 
the  subject  was  all  too  powerful  in  its  influence  upon 
him ;  and,  leaving  it,  he  resumed  with  fresh  zeal  his 
aesthetic  researches. 

Toward  the  close  of  the  year  CaroHne  again  came  to 
Jena,  to  make  a  longer  stay.  She  suffered  much,  and 
busied  herself  now  with  various  Hterary  work,  hoping 
to  earn  money  thereby,  and  to  provide  against  the  dark 
days  which  seemed  at  hand.  Some  of  her  stories  met 
with  great  praise  from  Schiller.  "An  employment 
that  deeply  interests  me  lifts  me  above  all  bodily 
torment,"  he  writes  on  the  11th  of  January;  "I  often 
wish  that  my  health  might  only  stay  with  me  until 
this  '  Kallias '  were  finished."  He  was  immeasurably 
delighted  at  having  discovered  an  objective  definition 
of  the  beautiful ;  but  the  subject  needed  very  deep  and 
thorough  investigation,  and  he  must  wholly  master  it 
before  attempting  this,  before  producing  satisfactory 
work. 

Then  the  news  reached  him  of  the  execution  of  the 
ill-fated  Louis  Seize.  On  February  8th  he  writes: 
"  For  a  fortnight  I  can  look  at  no  French  paper,  so 
sickened  am  I  with  these  wretched  knacker's  men." 
In  the  same  letter  he  states  to  Korner  his  conviction 
that  Beauty  is  nothing  but  Freedom  in  visible  form. 
On  the  next  day  he  asks  the  Prince  of  Augustenburg 
for  permission  to  put  before  his  Highness  in  a  series  of 
letters  his  ideas  upon  the  philosophy  of  beauty.  The 
Kantian  philosophy,  he  said,  also  furnished  rules  for 
a  system  of  Esthetics,  and  its  originator  had  missed 
the  merit  of  expounding  tliis  system  solely  by  reason 
of  a  preconceived  notion  of  his  own.     When  spring 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  331 

came  Schiller  suffered  from  fresh  attacks  of  illness; 
notwithstauding,  his  mental  power  never  flagged,  but 
he  worked  on  with  restless  energy.  To  Korner  he  sent 
detailed  accounts  of  his  aesthetic  researches.  He  read 
with  keen  interest  the  proofs  of  Kant's  remarkable 
essay,  entitled  "  Eeligion  within  the  Bounds  of  Mere 
Keason."  And  he  was  now  thinking  over  two  philo- 
sophic poems ;  the  one  was  to  be  a  Theodicy,  and  the 
other  should  have  even  more  success.  He  had  taken  a 
httle  garden-house  for  the  summer,  as  Lotte  was  unwell, 
and  shunned  the  noise  of  their  common  dinner-table ; 
his  second  sister  Louise  was  to  come  and  manage 
household  affairs.  Whether  he  travelled  to  Suabia  in 
the  summer  or  the  autumn  would  depend  upon  the 
state  of  his  health.  He  had  twice  asked  the  Duke  of 
Wiirtemberg  for  leave  to  visit  his  home  in  order  to  take 
the  baths  there ;  but  he  was  still  without  an  answer. 
Writing  at  the  end  of  January,  his  mother  said  that 
probably  the  duke  felt  vexed  at  the  performance  in 
Stuttgart  of  "  Plot  and  Passion "  a  fortnight  since. 
This  would  explain  his  silence.  The  play,  she  said, 
had  in  truth  been  very  warmly  received,  and  the  hered- 
itary prince,  who  was  present,  joined  in  the  general 
applause.  But  the  aristocracy,  who  came  in  for  sharp 
criticism,  had  complained  to  the  duke  of  the  play,  who 
forbade  its  further  performance.  His  Grace  had  also 
refused  the  petition  of  Schiller's  father  for  an  increase 
of  salary,  giving  him,  it  is  true,  the  barren  assurance 
that  he  would  show  him  favour  in  another  way.  Then 
in  his  seventieth  year,  this  faithful  servant  still  only 
received  four  hundred  gulden,  although  he  knew  that 
he  was  entitled  to  a  thousand.  It  was  this  great 
injustice  that  made  him  resolve  to  get  a  name  by  issu- 
ing a  book  that  should  show  his  mastery  of  some 
particular  subject,  and  thus  the  duke,  not  liking  to  let 
him  go,  would  be  induced  to  give  him  a  higher  salary. 
The  work  in  question  was  called  "  Thoughts  About 


332  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Tree-gromng  on  a  Large  Scale,"  and  Schiller,  on  re- 
ceiving a  copy  from  his  father,  asked  Goeschen  to 
publish  it. 

About  the  middle  of  March  the  attacks  of  spasms 
returned.  In  these  days  Huber  came  to  Jena,  staying 
with  Professor  Schiitz  there,  and  working  assiduously 
for  the  Litcratur  Zeitung.  SchiUer  was  glad  that  little 
opportunity  occurred  for  meeting  liis  quondam  friend 
alone,  who  had  treated  Dora  Stock  so  heartlessly,  and 
had  basely  tricked  Forster,  his  friend.  Huber  spoke  of 
his  circumstances,  but  they  could  not  have  any  inti- 
mate talk  together,  for  Schiller  no  longer  cherished 
respect  for  the  man  that  once  he  had  heartily  loved. 
On  the  2 2d,  while  lecturing,  the  poet  was  seized  by  an 
attack  of  his  malady.  "  My  life  is  so  rent  by  these 
wretched  seizures,  that  I  can  make  no  real  progress  in 
anything."  So  he  writes,  lamentingly,  to  Korner.  On 
the  26tli  he  finished  his  course  of  lectures,  and,  soon 
afterward,  Humboldt  came  from  Erfurt  to  Jena  for 
a  few  days,  wishing  to  see  Schiller  before  he  went  back 
to  his  home.  The  poet  had  recently  inserted  part  of 
an  historical  work  by  Humboldt  in  the  Thalia,  though 
he  failed  in  an  endeavour  to  make  Goeschen  publish 
the  whole.  Humboldt  had  then  turned  to  the  study  of 
Greek  hterature,  and  submitted  to  Scliiller  for  criticism 
an  essay  of  his  upon  "  The  Greeks."  Now,  when  they 
both  met,  this  and  like  matters  were  discussed.  Schil- 
ler's mental  gifts  made  such  stirring  impression  upon 
Humboldt,  that  in  order  to  benefit  by  his  society  he 
promised  to  come  and  stay  in  Jena  during  the  follow- 
ing year. 

On  April  the  7th  Schiller  was  able  to  get  out  into 
the  garden  and  enjoy  again  the  sight  of  fields  and  sky ; 
for  all  through  that  winter  he  had  hardly  been  five 
times  beyond  the  doors.  He  speaks  in  his  letters  of 
disagreeable  work  which  now  took  up  his  time ;  per- 
haps this  was  the  preface  to   a  new  volume  of  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  S33 

"Memoirs."  He  was  overjoyed  both  at  the  prospect 
of  a  visit  from  Korner,  and  of  his  own  journey  to 
Suabia.  There  was  still  no  answer  from  the  Duke 
Karl  Eugene,  yet  he  did  not  like  to  venture  sending 
a  third  petition,  particularly  as  it  was  still  very  doubt- 
ful whether  his  health  could  allow  him  to  travel. 

Then  came  fresh  attacks  of  spasms,  which  quite 
robbed  him  of  all  power  to  write  or  think  ;  Lotte  fell 
ill  also,  and  this  added  to  his  distress.  He  had  aban- 
doned the  "  Kalhas "  and  wished  to  publish  his  views 
upon  Esthetics  in  a  series  of  papers.  He  set  eagerly 
to  work  upon  an  essay  on  "  Grace  and  Dignity,"  that, 
illness  notwithstanding,  was  finished  in  six  weeks.  Its 
style  has  an  unusual  tone  of  vivacity  and  happiness 
about  it,  which  would  never  let  one  guess  in  what 
a  time  of  gloom  and  sorrow  it  was  composed.  The 
essay  at  once  appeared  in  Thalia  and  gained  general 
praise.  In  it  he  seeks  to  confute  Kant's  rigid  laws  of 
conduct,  by  the  doctrine  that  man  should  seek  to  bring 
his  physical  and  moral  impulses  into  thorough  harmony, 
so  that  he  may  freely  and  gladly  follow  the  dictates  of 
reason.  As  an  ideal  of  human  beauty  he  points  to 
that  blending  of  grace  and  dignity  which  we  see  in  the 
ancients.  Immediately  after  this  success  he  began  to 
write  another  essay  upon  the  Pathetic. 

In  June  it  was  fixed  that  for  the  first  he  should  go 
to  Heilbronn;  from  that  place  he  intended  to  write 
to  the  duke.  He  counted  greatly  upon  the  professional 
skni  of  Doctor  Gmelin,  a  physician  there,  widely  known 
through  cures  effected  by  means  of  magnetism.  Money 
had  already  been  sent  by  him  to  his  sister  Louise  to 
defray  the  expenses  of  her  coming  to  Jena ;  but  this 
plan  of  making  her  his  housekeeper  was  given  up, 
partly  because  of  the  mother's  indisposition  and  partly 
on  account  of  his  proposed  journey  to  HeUbronn.  We 
here  give  a  facsimile  of  the  postscript  added  by  Schil- 
ler's father  to  a  letter  of  the  15th  of  July.     Christo- 


334  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

phine  wished  to  come  and  see  liim  with  her  husband, 
and  he  was  dehghted  at  the  thought.  WTien  Eeinwald 
wrote  asking  him  to  forgive  his  gloominess  and  depres- 
sion, he  answered  :  "  No  business  and  no  sickness  shall, 
as  I  hope,  keep  me  from  feeling  hearty  joy  at  your 
coming.  Bring  your  whole  set  of  moods  with  you, 
dear  Keinwald ;  one  hypochondriac  will  have  patience 
with  another. 

"  We  shall  not  let  you  go  so  soon,  this  time.  And 
so  during  this  happy  summer  I  shall  bring  my  two 
dear  sisters  together  [he  did  not  know  tliat  Louise's 
journey  had  been  given  up],  and  shall  be  able  to  show 
my  good  Eeinwald  that,  despite  Heaven  knows  how 
many  slights  on  my  part,  the  love  and  the  hearty 
respect  I  feel  for  him  have  ever  remained  the  same." 

At  midday,  on  the  25th,  he  drove  as  far  as  Erfurt 
to  meet  his  friends,  taking  leave  of  the  Koadjutor  on 
the  following  day.  Schiller  was  now  gladdened  by  the 
prospect  of  becoming  a  father.  Writiug  to  Kcirner,  he 
says :  "  I  feel  freed  from  half  my  suffering  now.  It  is 
as  if  I  saw  the  waning  torch  of  my  own  life  rekindled 
in  another ;  and  I  have  made  my  peace  with  Fate." 
The  gift  of  money  from  Denmark  having  now  reached 
hira,  he  was  delighted  to  begin  discharging  his  debt 
to  Korner ;  but  in  view  of  the  expenses  which  his 
journey  would  entail,  and  as  fees  from  Goeschen  were 
still  unpaid,  he  could  only  send  his  friend  a  remittance 
of  sixteen  louis  d'or.  It  was  a  very  great  disappoint- 
ment that,  on  account  of  this  journey  he  was  about  to 
make,  Korner  could  not  visit  him.  Frequent  letters 
now  passed  between  the  poet  and  Frau  von  Kalb,  who 
in  May  had  written  to  him  about  a  tutor.  He  tells 
Korner  that "  her  head  seems  still  not  quite  sound,  and 
she  appears  to  be  more  excitable  than  ever ;  but  the 
surface  is  calmer." 

A  visit  from  Baggesen  now  dehghted  him.  He  was 
travelhng  to   Switzerland   with  his  wife,  and  passed 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  335 

through  Jena  en  route.  During  his  stay,  Schiller  wrote 
a  second  letter  to  the  Hereditary  Prince  of  Augusten- 
burg,  who  had  replied  in  a  most  friendly  way  to  the 
first,  assuring  him  how  warmly  he  would  welcome  the 
series  of  letters  which  Schiller  proposed  to  address  to 
him.  This  time  Schiller  set  forth  his  reasons  for 
choosing  such  a  subject  so  far  removed  from  all  the 
momentous  questions  of  the  hour.  "  This  effort  of 
the  French  people  to  estal^lish  their  sacred  rights  of 
humanity  and  to  gain  pohtical  freedom  has  only 
brought  to  light  their  unworthiness  and  impotence ; 
and,  not  this  ill-fated  nation  alone,  but  with  it  a  con- 
siderable part  of  Europe,  and  a  whole  century,  have 
been  hurled  back  into  barbarism  and  servitude.  Of 
moments,  this  was  the  most  propitious ;  but  it  came  to 
a  corrupt  generation,  unworthy  to  seize  it,  unworthy 
to  profit  by  it.  The  use  which  this  generation  makes 
and  has  made  of  so  great  a  gift  of  chance,  incontestably 
shows  that  the  human  race  cannot  yet  dispense  with 
the  guardianship  of  might ;  that  reason  steps  in  too 
soon  where  the  bondage  of  brute  force  has  hardly  been 
shaken  off ;  and  that  he  is  not  yet  ripe  for  ciml  liberty, 
to  the  attainment  of  whose  human  liberty  so  much  is 
still  missing.  .  .  .  Freedom,  pohtical  and  civil,  remains 
ever  and  always  the  holiest  of  all  possessions,  the 
worthiest  goal  of  all  striving,  the  great  rallying-point 
of  all  culture ;  but  this  glorious  structure  can  only  be 
raised  upon  the  firm  basis  of  an  ennobled  character; 
and,  before  a  citizen  can  be  given  a  constitution,  one 
must  see  that  the  citizen  be  himself  soundly  consti- 
tuted." Speaking  of  the  spirit  of  the  age,  he  said  that 
it  urgently  needed  refining,  ennobling,  quite  independ- 
ently of  any  reform  in  politics.  Art  and  Taste  must 
help  toward  this  end.  But  Art  must  have  ideals,  and 
ever  hold  before  her  the  image  of  the  highest  form 
of  beauty,  however  much  the  age  may  rob  itself  of 
dignity ;  Art  must  "  by  a  code  of  her  own  be  protected 


336  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

alike  from  the  tyranny  cf  a  local  and  one-sided  taste 
and  from  the  anarchy  of  a  lawless  one  —  from  bar- 
barism. Ideals  she  already  partly  possesses  in  the 
imperishable  models  to  which  Greek  genius  and  the 
kindred  genius  of  a  few  moderns  have  given  birth,  and 
which  for  ever  unsurpassed  wiU  outlive  all  passing 
whims  of  fashionable  taste.  But  a  code  is  what  she 
has  never  had  yet,  and  to  supply  her  with  this  is  one 
of  the  hardest  problems  that  philosophising  reason  can 
set  itself.  For  what  can  be  harder  than  to  bring  the 
workings  of  genius  under  rules,  to  reconcile  Freedom 
with  Necessity  ? " 

With  this  letter  was  enclosed  the  essay  on  "  Grace 
and  Dignity,"  in  which  he  said  he  had  announced  and 
put  forth  some  of  those  ideas  on  whose  fuller  develop- 
ment he  would  now  employ  himself.  The  subsequent 
letters  were  to  be  matured  under  his  native  sky. 
Schiller  had,  besides,  as  a  further  development  of 
certain  Kantian  ideas,  completed  for  the  Thalia  his 
essay  "  On  the  Sublime,"  at  the  end  of  which  he 
deduces  from  the  nature  of  the  Pathetic-Sublime 
the  two  leading  principles  of  all  Tragic  Art.  Shortly 
before  setting  out,  he,  at  the  same  time  with  Goethe, 
Herder,  and  Wieland,  was  named  Honorary  Member 
of  the  Scientific  Society,  founded  by  his  friend  Professor 
Batsch,  who,  firm  in  character  and  free  in  thought, 
was  fighting  his  way  under  adverse  circumstances. 
He  was  also  cheered  by  a  brief  intercourse  with  Voigt, 
and  with  his  lady,  a  lover  of  poetry  and  art. 

All  the  longing  and  delight  with  which  he  yearned 
for  the  home  of  his  childhood  come  out  in  what  he 
writes  to  Korner.  "  The  delightful  prospect  I  have 
before  me  brightens  my  heart.  I  shall  taste  the  joys 
at  once  of  a  sou  and  of  a  father ;  and  between  these 
two  sentiments  of  nature,  my  inmost  being  will  be 
supremely  blest.  .  .  .  Love  to  my  native  land  has 
grown  very  lively  in  me,  and  the  Suabian,  which  I 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  337 

thought  I  had  entirely  doffed,  is  stirring  vigorously. 
But  then  I  have  been  parted  from  it  for  eleven  years ; 
and  Thuringia  is  not  the  country  to  make  one  forget 
Suabia."  And  so,  on  the  2d  of  August  he  quitted  that 
pleasant  Athens  on  the  Saale,  after  a  professorial  career 
of  over  four  years,  which  had  been  interrupted  and 
greatly  hindered  by  severe  and  continuous  suffering, 
and  which  he  was  never  to  resume. 


Book   IX. 

Visiting  Home 


CHAPTEE   I. 

,  AUGUST,    1793,    TO    MAY,    1794. 

Passing  through  Niirnberg,  where  SchiUer  visited 
his  friend  Erhard,  now  settled  there  as  a  physician, 
and  also  met  Baggesen,  he  and  Frau  Schiller,  after  a 
toilsome  journey  in  a  conveyance  of  their  own,  reached 
Heilbronn  on  the  8th  of  August.  Here,  having  in  the 
first  instance  put  up  at  the  Sun  Hotel,  he  had  the 
happiness  of  embracing  again,  after  so  long  a  separation, 
his  father,  now  almost  seventy,  yet  the  picture  of  a 
green  old  age,  kept  in  health  by  constant  activity,  and 
his  sister  Louise,  who  was  eighteen.  It  was  agreed 
that  the  father  should  ask  the  duke's  permission  to 
visit  his  son  occasionally  at  Heilbronn,  and  should  at 
the  same  time  insinuate  the  wish  of  the  latter  to  use 
the  waters  at  Cannstadt.  Their  hope  that  Karl  Eugene 
would  be  induced  by  this,  and  by  a  hint  at  the  great 
expense  of  the  journey,  to  accord  to  his  runaway  pupil 
and  ex-regimental  surgeon  a  free  return  to  the  laud 
of  his  birth,  was  never  fulfilled.  Schiller  had  therefore 
to  settle  down  at  Heilbronn,  to  which  place  his  parents 
sent  him  beds.  He  lodged  at  the  merchant  Eueffs,  by 
the  Sulmerthor.  From  Heilbronn,  he  ventured  once 
without  leave  to  visit  his  friend  Hoven  at  Ludwigsburg, 
and  his  parents  at  SoHtude. 

As  everything  but  the  good  Neckar  wine  was  very 
dear  at  Heilbronn,  he  set  up  housekeeping  for  himself, 
but  failed  to  secure  the  desired  domestic  comfort  and 
enlivening  society  for  himself  and  Lotte.     In  Gmelin, 

341 


342  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

who  considered  the  magnetic  cure  was  not  the  thing 
for  him,  he  found  a  very  "  fidele  Patron  "  and  a  saga- 
cious doctor,  and  with  Senator  Schiiller  he  maintained 
friendly  intercourse,  but  they  never  grew  very  intimate ; 
and,  as  for  any  interest  in  art,  so  dear  to  Schiller,  there 
was  not  a  trace.  As  the  continual  marching  of  troops 
through  the  town  caused  great  disturbance,  and  the 
ten  leagues'  distance  from  Solitude  made  it  difficult  to 
visit  his  relations,  he  determined  to  move  his  quarters 
to  Ludwigsburg,  of  which  he  cherished  kindly  youthful 
recollections.  This  he  previously  notified  to  the  duke, 
but  he  happened  to  be  on  a  journey  down  the  Ehine. 
In  Heilbronn,  too,  he  found  Margareta  Schwan  again, 
but  in  what  changed  circumstances !  —  as  the  wife  of 
a  clerk  and  pettifogger,  one  Treffz,  of  that  place.  Her 
father  had  been  so  enraged  at  her  throwing  herself 
away  on  this  man  that  he  had  cast  her  o£f.  Not  until 
she  had  been  in  actual  want,  would  he  help  her,  and 
that  scantily,  out  of  his  abundance.  Lotte  was  witness 
of  the  deep  emotion  with  which  the  pair,  severed  by 
old  Schwau's  caprice,  met  again.  Poor  Margareta !  she 
only  lived  a  few  years  longer,  dying  on  January  7, 
1796. 

On  the  8th  of  September  Schiller  moved  to  Ludwigs- 
burg. Here  he  found  in  Hoven  a  faithful  friend  of 
his  youth,  who,  indeed,  hke  all  his  acquaintances, 
seemed  to  him  to  have  grown  somewhat  boorish. 
Still,  he  got  on  very  well  wdth  him,  in  hearty  recol- 
lections of  the  halcyon  days  of  youth ;  and  they 
carried  on  much  thoughtful  talk,  though  Hoven  also 
showed  no  taste  for  art,  and  no  effort  in  that  direction. 
Schiller  specially  prized  him  as  a  skilful  surgeon,  whose 
aid  Lotte  very  soon  required.  The  mother  and  Nanette 
came  on  a  visit  to  Ludwigsburg ;  Carohne,  too,  and 
her  sister-in-law,  Ubike  von  Beulwitz,  arrived  from 
Cannstadt,  to  stay  in  the  house.  The  confinement 
took  place  sooner  than  was  expected,  on  the  night  of 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  343 

the  14th.  Lotte  had  suffered  long,  and  Schiller  went 
to  bed  in  great  anxiety.  Hoven's  wife  brought  the 
boy  to  the  sleeping  father;  her  coming  awoke  him, 
when  his  first  glance  fell  on  the  pledge  of  faithful  love. 
His  joy  at  Lotte's  safety  and  the  new  happiness  of 
fatherhood  stirred  up  the  poet's  soul ;  fervently  he 
thanked  destiny,  which  chained  him  by  a  new  tie 
to  Hfe.  The  baptism  took  place  ten  days  after,  in 
the  presence  of  his  parents  and  sisters.  Sponsors  to 
the  little  "  Karl  Friedrich  Ludwig  "  were  the  Duchess 
Louise,  the  Koadjutor,  Frau  von  Lengenfeld,  the  grand- 
parents, and  Hoven's  wife  and  father.  The  boy  took 
his  first  two  names  from  the  Koadjutor^  and  Schiller, 
the  third  was  doubtless  to  be  a  memento  of  Ludwigs- 
burg.  It  was  touching  to  see  the  old  couple  bless 
their  grandchild,  especially  the  grandmother,  who 
officiated  in  a  black  dress,  which  is  still  preserved  in 
the  family.  Schiller  took  care  to  report  the  birth  of 
his  son  to  the  Duke  of  Weimar.  At  Ludwigsburg, 
Karl  Eugene  left  him  unmolested ;  he  had  made  no 
reply  even  to  the  third  apphcation,  though  he  had 
allowed  the  father  to  use  the  Cannstadt  baths  for  the 
pains  in  his  limbs.  Schiller  made  some  trips  with 
Hoven  to  the  neighbouring  towns,  though  he  still 
suffered  much  from  the  spasms ;  he  had  a  dreadful 
attack  of  them  one  evening  on  his  way  home.  About 
this  time  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  his  old 
opponent  Staudlin  come  cringing  to  him  and  begging 
him  to  recommend  the  Magister  Holderhn  of  Stuttgart 
to  the  place  of  steward  with  Frau  von  Kalb.  Holderlin 
waited  upon  Schiller,  and,  on  his  report,  was  engaged 
by  the  Frau,  though  the  poet  told  her  that,  from  his 
half-hour's  acquaintance,  he  hardly  thought  him  quite 
steady  yet  in  his  principles,  and  did  not  expect 
anything  very  solid  from  his  attainments  or  his 
manners. 

Schiller's  sufferings  increased  with  the  beginning  of 


344  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

October ;  he  was  seldom  able  to  brace  himself  for  work, 
and  for  days  together  he  loathed  desk  and  pen. 

"  So  stubborn  a  complaint,  free  intervals  so  sparingly- 
doled  out,  often  depress  me  sorely,"  he  writes  to 
Korner.  "  Never  was  I  so  rich  in  projects  of  literary 
labour,  never  so  little  able  to  hold  out ;  and  that, 
owing  to  the  most  wretched  of  all  hindrances,  bodily 
suffering.  Of  larger  compositions  I  dare  not  think  at 
all,  now ;  and  I  am  glad  if  only  from  time  to  time  I 
can  finish  a  small  whole."  Thus  a  work  on  Esthetic 
intercourse  gave  him  much  pleasure  at  this  time ;  for 
the  Tlicdia  he  planned  writing  an  essay  on  the  Naive. 
His  uncertain  condition  was  the  more  deplorable,  as  he 
believed  there  was  a  good  prospect  of  the  Duke  and 
Duchess  of  Weimar,  with  whom  he  stood  well,  entrust- 
ing him  with  the  education  of  the  hereditary  prince, 
then  ten  years  old. 

While  he  kept  himself  very  retired  at  Ludwigsburg, 
he  could  not  altogether  escape  the  visits  of  his  Stutt- 
gart friends.  There  came  the  wine-loving  Librarian 
Petersen  and  the  jolly  epigrammatist  Secretary  Haug, 
who  brought  with  him  his  fat  assistant  Conz,  from 
Vailiingen.  Schiller,  when  in  a  merry  mood,  was 
tempted  to  try  and  make  Petersen  drunk,  but  the 
attempt  ended  in  his  own  discomfiture.  He  felt  most 
attracted  by  Conz,  a  good  Grecian,  whose  translations 
from  Greek,  then  just  published  under  the  name  of 
"  Analecta,"  contained  many  good  things.  He  thought 
Conz  had  made  gi'eat  advances  since  he  met  him  at 
Jena.  Of  strangers,  Schiller  received  a  visit  from 
Matthisson,  then  travelling  to  Switzerland,  who  found 
him  deadly  pale  and  wasting  away.  Caroline,  the 
sister-in-law,  who  lived  with  the  Schillers,  was  in  very 
bad  health,  and  the  divorce  which  she  was  constantly 
urging,  and  which  the  mother  disapproved,  occasioned 
many  a  misunderstanding. 

While  Schiller  grew  more  and  more  depressed  and 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  345 

feeble,  the  duke,  who  had  never  been  able  to  get  over 
his  ill-will  against  him,  died  at  Hoheuheim  on  the 
24th,  after  a  lengthy  illness.  Startled  as  Schiller  may- 
have  been  for  the  moment  by  the  death  of  his  quondam 
"  Pater  "  and  persecutor,  he  shed  for  him  no  tear.  He 
could  calmly  see  the  prince,  who  never  would  forgive 
him,  entombed  in  the  palace  church  of  Ludwigsburg. 

To  Korner  he  called  him  "  old  Herod,"  whose  suc- 
cessor was  at  all  events  a  man ;  in  challenging  Haug 
to  a  walk  to  Ludwigsburg,  he  added,  sarcastically : 
"  Were  it  only  as  a  pilgrimage  to  the  precious  remains 
of  a  master  who  deserved  so  well  of  you."  He  did  not 
exult  over  his  death  —  nay,  he  recognised  the  duke's 
great  services  to  education  in  Wlirtemberg;  but  the 
remembrance  of  his  unbending  rigour  always  awakened 
bitter  resentment  —  the  old  scar  smarted  anew  at  every 
touch. 

It  was  through  Haug  that  Johann  Christoph  Cotta, 
then  in  his  thirtieth  year  —  who  six  years  before  had 
taken  over  his  father's  bookselling  business  at  Tiibiugen 
—  tried  to  form  a  connection  with  the  renowned  coun- 
tryman whom  once  he  had  ridiculed  in  Staudlin's 
Blumenlese.  Schiller  replied  that  he  would  be  glad, 
if  only  for  Hang's  sake,  to  give  Cotta  some  work  to 
publish,  but  Goeschen  had  the  first  right  to  the 
"  Theory  of  Esthetic  Intercourse,"  on  which  he  was 
then  engaged.  His  tragedy,  "  The  Knights  of  St. 
John"  (of  Malta),  should  it  ever  come  to  anything, 
was  more  at  his  own  disposal,  but  he  could  not  let 
him  have  it  under  thirty  Carolines,  for  it  cost  him 
three  or  four  times  as  much  labour  as  the  best  of  his 
philosophical  or  historical  writings.  But  how  could 
he  at  that  time  have  collected  and  raised  his  powers  to 
the  level  of  a  great  dramatic  poem  ? 

After  keeping  his  father's  birthday  with  his  relatives 
at  Solitude,  he  had  to  forego  the  pleasure  of  their  pres- 
ence at  his  own,  for  they  were  kept  away  by  indisposi- 


346  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

tion.  Shortly  before  this  he  had  struck  off  his  third 
letter  to  the  Hereditary  Prince  of  Augustenburg,  in 
which  he  pointed  out  the  influence  of  aesthetic  on 
moral  culture.  By  November  11th  he  finished  the 
fourth  letter,  and  in  the  next  three  weeks  followed  it 
up  by  three  more,  in  which  the  most  fruitful  ideas  of 
his  "  Kunstler "  were  more  fully  carried  out.  And 
here  he  did  not  conceal  from  the  prince  that  taste  is 
to  the  refined  man  what  religion  is  to  the  animal  man ; 
that  it  does  for  our  ordinary  life  what  reUgion  does  at 
the  point  where  sensation  ceases.  "  On  one  of  these 
two  props,  if  not  rather  on  both,  we  must  lean,"  says 
he,  "  so  long  as  we  are  not  gods."  No  doubt  the  state- 
ment somewhat  startled  the  hereditary  prince  and  his 
circle  of  acquaintances  who  used  to  devour  the  letters 
when  communicated  to  them.  About  this  time  he  had 
a  special  reprint  made  of  his  treatise  on  "  Grace  and 
Dignity"  (of  which  Schiitz  sent  him  some  passages 
done  into  Latin),  with  the  dedication  on  the  title-page : 

"  To  Karl  von  Dalberg. 

« What  here  thou  seest,  great  spirit, 
Thou  art  thyself.'  —  Milton." 

Copies  of  the  corresponding  sheets  of  the  Thalia  were 
also  published  with  this  title.  His  object  was  to 
show  to  the  Koadjutor  that,  despite  the  unhappy  times, 
he  trusted  him  still. 

The  letters  to  the  prince  were,  alas !  but  gleams  of 
light  amid  a  gloomy  time  for  Schiller  in  spite  of  his 
domestic  bliss;  a  time  when  such  a  trifling  thing  as 
Korner's  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  definition  of 
the  Beautiful  and  Sublime  caused  him  to  be  bitterly 
offended  with  his  old  and  faithful  friend,  so  that  to 
him  also  he  felt  totally  silent.  Not  till  December  10th 
had  he  got  so  far  the  better  of  his  feelings  that  he 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  347 

could   open  his   heart  to    him    again.     And    still    he 
writes  with  irritation :  "  Since  my  last  letter  (October 
4th)  so  many  things  have  combined  to  shake  my  con- 
stancy  of  mind.     An  illness   of  my   httle  one,  from 
which  he  has  quite  recovered  now ;  my  own  ailments, 
which  leave  me  very  few  free  hours ;  the  vagueness  of 
my  outlooks  for  the  future,  for  the  Mainz  prospects 
are  quite   overcast  again ;  doubts  of  my  own  genius, 
unstrengthened,  uncheered    as  it  is  by  any  healthful 
contact  from  without,  the  total  absence  of  intellectual 
conversation,  such  as  has  become  a  necessity  to  me. 
.  .  .  My  nervous   sufferings   have   made  my  feelings 
more  irritable,  more  sensitive  to  all  that  is  crooked, 
hard,  coarse,  and  tasteless.     I   demand  more  of  men 
than  before,  and  have  the  ill  hap  to  be  thrown  to- 
gether with   such   as  are  wholly  unprovided   in  that 
respect.  .  .  .  Heaven  grant  that  my  patience  do  not 
break  down,  and  that  a  life  so  often  interrupted  by 
a  real  death  may  still  hold  some  value  for  me.  .  .  . 
This  long  while  it  is  my  activity  alone  that  has  made 
life  endurable  to  me  ;  and  in  such  a  situation  it  may 
have  chanced  that  I  took  this  subjective  worth,  which 
my  labours  have  to  myself,  for  objective,  and  thought 
better  of  them  than  perhaps  they  deserved.     In  short, 
I  imagine  that  both  in  my  letters  of  last  winter  and  in 
some  later  printed  essays  I  had  thrown  out  ideas  that 
deserved  a  warmer  reception  than  they  met  with  at 
your  hands.     With  this  drought   all   around    me,  it 
would  really  have  done  me  good  to  receive  some  en- 
couragement from  you ;  and  with  the  opinion  I  have 
of  you,  I  could  only  interpret  your  silence  or  coldness 
to  my  own  disadvantage.     But  in  truth  I  needed  cheer- 
ing up  rather  than  casting  down ;  overconfidence  in 
self  has  never  been  my  failing."     He  was  then  hoping 
to  get  the  first  volume   of   his  Letters  to  the  prince 
printed   before  Easter.     Unfortunately  the   distemper 
lasted    longer ;    and  as  the   ever-increasing  dearth   at 


348  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

Ludwigsburg  pinched  him  too,  he  was  for  coming 
away  in  the  middle  of  winter ;  but  fi'om  thi.s  his 
mother-in-law,  in  forwarding  her  yearly  remittance  of 
two  hundred  thalers,  earnestly  dissuaded  him. 

When  the  dreaded  first  half  of  January  was  over  he 
felt  a  good  deal  better,  yet  longed  to  be  back  at  Jena 
and  among  his  friends ;  if  he  continued  as  well,  and  if 
the  weather  permitted,  he  would  leave  Suabia  at  the 
beginning  of  March.  "  My  wife  is  still  in  very  toler- 
able health,"  he  writes  to  Kcirner  after  an  eight  weeks' 
silence,  "  and  the  baby  is  hfe  itself.  He  is  a  very  great 
joy  to  me  already,  and  his  vivacity  gives  me  hopes  that 
in  another  six  or  eight  months  he  will  be  at  all  sorts 
of  mad  pranks."  His  Letters  he  now  means  to  keep  in 
his  desk  another  four  months  at  least,  though  they 
would  already  fill  about  fourteen  sheets  in  print.  From 
the  "  Influence  of  the  Beautiful  on  Man  "  he  had  gone 
on  to  the  effect  of  the  theory  on  appreciation  and  pro- 
duction of  the  Beautiful,  and  was  just  then  at  the 
production,  independent  of  all  theory,  of  the  Original 
Beautiful.  Here  he  stopped  to  turn  to  his  "  Wallen- 
stein  "  again.  Hoven  says  that  he  read  some  complete 
scenes  of  the  play,  even  then. 

He  and  Schiller  went  over  to  Tiibingen  for  three 
days,  to  which  place  the  veteran  Abel  had  been  trans- 
ferred. They  had  got  down  at  the  hotel,  but  Abel 
would  not  rest  until  their  trunk  was  brought  to  his 
residence,  the  Bursch,  as  it  was  called,  where  he  had 
the  oversight  of  the  theological  students,  maintained 
there  free  of  cost.  And  his  guests  from  Ludwigsburg 
were  to  dine  in  the  common  room  with  them.  Schil- 
ler was  delighted  with  his  good  old  master,  who  had 
been  of  such  service  to  him.  He  called  upon  Cotta  on 
the  same  occasion. 

At  the  news  that  an  imperial  infirmary  was  coming 
to  Ludwigsburg,  the  fear  that  patients  would  be  quar- 
tered in  it  threw  the  poet,  then  abnormally  excitable. 


Schiller  in  Shittgart,   ij()4 

Photogravure  after  the  paintinp  bv  H.  Gaiipp 


r  • 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  349 

into  such  distress  that  he  wanted  to  move  in  all  haste 
to  Stuttgart,  although  on  account  of  painful  memories 
he  had  purposed  not  to  set  foot  in  that  city.  But  the 
removal  was  delayed.  Besides  this,  the  future  of  his 
father  made  him  anxious,  for  the  new  duke  hated 
Solitude  no  less  than  the  academy,  and  thought  of 
suppressing  them  both ;  there  was  even  a  talk  of  pull- 
ing down  the  palace  and  all  the  buildings,  of  destroying 
the  gardens  and  pleasure-grounds,  of  transplanting  the 
orangery  and  removing  the  nursery.  The  mother  was 
beside  herself  at  the  thought,  while  her  husband  firmly 
trusted  in  God  to  direct  matters.  Three  weeks  after 
this  Schiller  was  for  leaving  Suabia  all  in  a  hurry,  and 
wished  to  take  leave  of  his  parents  on  the  following 
Sunday,  March  10th.  His  father  with  a  heavy  heart 
consented,  moved  chiefly  by  the  fear  that  his  Fritz 
might  catch  the  prevailing  pestilence.  Happily  Schil- 
ler on  a  sudden  changed  his  purpose ;  he  went  to  Stutt- 
gart, where  the  fine  and  wholesome  air  was  soon  to 
benefit  his  health,  and  a  more  intellectual  life  to  sur- 
round him. 

On  the  17th  he  informs  Korner  that  he  thinks  of 
spending  a  few  weeks  pleasantly  in  Stuttgart,  and 
hopes  meanwhile  to  be  of  some  service  to  his  father. 
And,  in  fact,  it  was  arranged  that  the  old  man  should 
be  left  in  peace  at  Solitude ;  beside  which,  owing  prob- 
ably to  his  son's  connection  with  Haug,  who  was  pri- 
vate secretary  to  the  new  duke,  he  was  promoted  on 
the  26th  to  the  rank  of  Oberwachtmeister.  In  Stuttgart 
the  poet  lodged  at  the  court  gardener's  house,  behind  the 
Eeinsburg-strasse.  The  early  bright  and  beautiful  spring 
revived  him  wonderfully ;  he  had  not  felt  so  well  for 
a  long  time.  Briskly,  cheerily,  he  worked  away  at  the 
plot  of  his  "  Wallenstein  ; "  that  once  settled,  he  thought 
he  could  fill  up  the  scenes  in  three  weeks.  "  Here  the 
arts  flourish  to  an  uncommon  degree  for  South  Ger- 
many," he  wrote  to  Korner,  "  the  number  of  artists,  some 


350  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

of  them  not  inferior  to  any  of  yours,  has  greatly  refined 
the  taste  in  matters  of  painting,  sculpture,  and  music. 
There  is  a  book  society  that  spends  thirteen  hundred 
gulden  a  year  to  get  what  is  newest  in  literature  and 
pohtics.  Also  a  tolerable  theatre,  with  a  first-rate 
orchestra  and  very  good  ballet."  In  Dannecker,  a  friend 
of  his  youthful  days,  he  found  a  true  genius  for  art, 
which  had  been  nobly  cultivated  by  a  four  years'  resi- 
dence in  Kome.  His  society  was  very  pleasant  to  him, 
and  he  learned  many  things  from  him  that  proved  use- 
ful in  his  cGsthetic  studies.  Dannecker  would  not  be 
refused  the  pleasure  of  modelling  his  bust.  Intercourse 
with  an  artist  so  full  of  ideas,  with  such  command  over 
form,  and  so  warm-hearted  as  well,  was  in  the  highest 
degree  quickening  and  enjoyable.  It  is  said  that  once 
when  Dannecker  came  to  Schiller's  to  continue  the 
almost  finished  work,  he  found  the  poet  asleep,  and 
took  the  opportunity  to  measure  every  part  of  the  head 
with  compasses,  and  on  comparing  them  with  those  of 
the  model,  found  the  agreement  exact.  Caroline  relates 
that  after  finishing  the  model  he  came  to  her  in  the 
adjoining  room  and  exclaimed,  with  tears  in  his  eyes, 
"  Ah  !  it  is  not  quite  what  I  meant  it  to  be,  after  all ! " 
Dannecker  introduced  Schiller  to  his  brother-in-law, 
the  merchant  Eapp,  who  was  practising  landscape- 
drawing,  and  his  remarks  on  the  treatment  of  land- 
scape were  particularly  interesting  to  the  poet.  He 
also  got  on  pleasantly  with  Hetsch  and  Scheffauer, 
and  no  less  with  good  Zumsteeg,  the  leading  musician 
of  the  place,  though  in  him  he  found  more  genius  than 
cultivation.  One  of  the  most  notable  scholars,  the 
court-chaplain  Werkmeister,  he  prized  especially  for 
his  leaning  to  the  Kantian  philosophy.  The  engraver 
MuUer  was  just  then  at  work  on  his  portrait  of  Graff. 
His  friend,  the  female  painter  Simanowitz,  born  a 
Eeichenbach,  painted  him,  and  afterward  his  wife. 
He  associated  besides  with    Petersen,  Haug,  and  the 


THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER  351 

Hart  man  n  family,  especially  Professor  Johann  Georg 
August  Hartmann,  whom  the  suppression  of  the  Karls- 
academie  at  Easter  had  left  at  leisure.  That  this  insti- 
tution, which  had  done  Schiller  himself  good  service  in 
many  ways,  should  come  to  an  end  just  while  he  was 
there,  touched  him  deeply.  At  that  very  moment,  too, 
Wilhelm  von  Wolzogen  came  back  to  Stuttgart,  and, 
to  the  excessive  annoyance  of  Frau  von  Lengenfeld, 
carried  off  his  old  love  Caroline  to  Switzerland ;  there 
they  stayed  at  Stein-am-Ehein  until  after  Schiller's 
departure. 

He  now  came  into  closer  contact  with  Cotta,  first  on 
the  subject  of  accepting  a  bill  of  two  hundred  thalers 
on  Goeschen.  Soon  after  he  offered  him  the  copyright 
of  a  new  "  Theatre  of  the  Greeks  "  in  about  seven  vol- 
umes, which  he  meditated  bringing  out  in  conjunction 
with  Professor  Nast  of  Stuttgart  and  Diaconus  Conz. 
Each  volume  was  to  contain  a  critique  from  his  hand 
of  the  pieces  translated  in  it,  which  would  give  him  an 
opportunity  of  setting  forth  the  leading  excellency  of 
Greek  tragedy,  and  the  whole  theory  of  tragic  composi- 
tion. The  matter  fell  through,  as  Cotta  would  have  no 
new  translations,  but  only  Schiller's  critical  disquisi- 
tions, and  to  get  all  of  these  ready  to  come  out  together 
would  certainly  have  demanded  much  time  and  toil. 

In  Stuttgart,  though  the  spasms  did  not  spare  him 
altogether,  Schiller  felt  a  great  deal  freer  and  stronger ; 
yet  by  degrees  there  stole  over  him  a  longing  for  friends 
in  the  north,  and  for  the  quiet,  regular  life  which  he 
needed  for  working ;  besides,  he  had  steps  to  take  about 
his  own  future.  Through  Frau  von  Stein,  Lotte  had 
applied  to  the  duchess  for  Schiller's  appointment  to  the 
office  of  tutor  to  the  hereditary  prince  ;  but,  glad  as  her 
Grace  would  have  been  to  secure  a  quiet  situation  for 
the  poet  she  loved  and  honoured,  his  broken  health 
forbade  her  holding  out  any  hopes.  He  wished  to  leave 
Stuttgart  as  early  as  the  23d  with  Paulus,  who  was 


352  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

hurrying  back  to  Jena ;  but  his  good  fortune  kept  post- 
poning the  time  of  departure.     For  it  was  during  those 
last  days  that  he  formed  a  connection  with  Cotta,  which 
proved  of  the  utmost  consequence  to  his  future  career. 
He  felt  drawn  once  more  to  Tiibingen,  where  his 
friends  were  full  of   plans  to    secure  the   services   of 
their  countryman  for  their  high  school.     This  time  he 
alighted,  by  previous  invitation,  at  Cotta's  house.    Here 
he  was  visited  by  Fichte,  who  had  been  appointed  to 
Jena  in  the  place  of  Reiuhold,  and  who  knew  Cotta 
also.      Fichte,  first  by  his  "  Essay  toward  a  Critique 
of  All  Inspiration,"  written  on  Kantian  principles,  and 
then  by  his  "  Aids  to  the  Correction  of  Popular  Opin- 
ions on  the  French  Eevolution,"  had  roused  Schiller's 
interest.     He  had  told  Korner  the  October  before  that 
the  author  would  be  "  a  great  acquisition  "  to  Jena,  one 
who  would  more  than   replace   Eeinhold,  at  least  in 
point  of  intellect.     Personal   contact  with  this  fresh 
and  vigorous  spirit,  just  then  at  work  in  remodelling 
philosophy  on  a  new  principle  which  raised  it  to  the 
rank  of  a  positive  science,  was  the  more  refreshingly 
welcome  to  Schiller,  as  he  himself  was  contemplating 
a  similar  transformation  of  aesthetics.    He  would  gladly 
have  travelled  to  Jena  with  him,  but  Fichte's  way  led 
him  through  Mainz.     After  that  Cotta  came  to  Stutt- 
gart, when,  on  4th  May,  he  made  an  excursion  with 
our  poet  to  the  Kahlenstein,  a  moderate  elevation  near 
Cannstadt,  presenting  one   of   the   loveliest  views   on 
which,    thirty    years    after.   King   Wilhelm    built  the 
Castle   of   Rosenstein.      Here  he  laid  before   Schiller 
his    scheme    of    a    "  Universal    Journal    of    European 
States,"    which    they    could    afterward    discuss    more 
fully.      From    Kahlenstein   they   drove   on  to  Unter- 
tiirkheim.       On  their   way  back   Schiller  unfolded  to 
the   enterprising   publisher  his   own   ideas  of  a  great 
journal    of    literature,   on   which   he   had  long  before 
expressed  his  views  to  Wieland,  Goeschen,  and  Korner. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  353 

Two  days  after  the  poet  quitted  Stuttgart.  His  par- 
ents were  in  such  health  that  he  might  venture  to  hope 
he  was  not  seeing  them  for  the  last  time.  His  father 
talked  of  making  a  journey  on  horseback  to  Meiningen 
and  Jena  the  following  year.  The  beginning  of  the 
MS.  of  his  new  work  on  tree-growing,  Schiller  took 
away  with  him ;  whatever  sum  it  realised  should  go 
toward  purchasing  the  horse  for  his  last  long  ride  to 
the  north.  Doctor  Erhard,  who  had  been  visiting  Italy 
with  Baron  Herbert,  found  him  still  at  Stuttgart.  This 
friend,  who  was  anxious  about  his  own  prospects,  hav- 
ing just  been  fleeced  by  a  swindler,  was  to  accompany 
him  to  Nurnberg,  when  on  the  6th  he  and  his  family 
left  the  Suabian  capital  never  to  see  it  again.  They 
came  by  way  of  Nurnberg  to  Mainz,  and  there  spent 
three  glorious  days,  enjoying  in  particular  the  lovely 
garden  that  Eeinwald  had  laid  out  upon  a  hill.  On 
the  15th  they  reached  home. 


Book   X. 

On  the  Height 


CHAPTER  I. 

FKOM  MAY,  1794,  TO  APRIL,  1796. 

We  now  stand  on  the  threshold  of  the  last  eleven 
years  allotted  to  our  poet.  During  these  years,  though 
a  constant  sufferer,  supported  and  helped  by  Korner 
and  by  three  new  and  most  important  friendships,  he 
was  destined  to  carry  out  fully  his  aesthetic  researches ; 
to  cultivate  his  lyric  and  dramatic  poetry  in  close 
connection  with  a  theatre  which  Goethe's  taste  guided ; 
to  win  the  grandest  triumphs  on  the  German  stage ;  to 
receive  homage  from  that  Prussian  capital,  for  which 
he  once  longed ;  to  earn  the  love  and  reverence  of  our 
nation  and  its  noblest  minds ;  to  meet  with  the  fullest 
recognition  from  kings  and  princes ;  and  to  enjoy  per- 
fect domestic  happiness  without  grinding  cares,  what 
though  that  energy  never  flagged,  which  was  both  in- 
dispensable to  himself  and  toward  ensuring  a  future 
for  his  family.  Battles  there  might  be  for  him  still, 
but  he  no  longer  stood  alone ;  he  fought  at  the  side 
of  the  great  poet  toward  whom  the  whole  current  of 
his  life  had  drifted  him.  There  were  collisions,  un- 
avoidable collisions,  but  they  could  not  disturb  him ; 
they  rather  braced  the  energies  of  a  spirit  dauntlessly 
striving  after  its  ideal. 

Schiller  went  into  lodgings  which  had  been  hired 
during  his  absence,  and  he  had  to  get  settled  down  in 
them  first.  The  house  opposite,  viz.  that  of  Court 
Commissary  Voigt,  had  been  inhabited  ever  since 
February  by  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt,  who  with   his 

357 


358  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

wife  and  child  meant  to  stay  at  Jena  till  the  autumn, 
chiefly  on  Schiller's  account.  All  this  while  he  had 
been  getting  more  than  ever  absorbed  with  the  Greeks, 
the  only  people,  he  said,  in  which  we  encounter  the 
complete  man  attuned  to  harmonious  action.  Even 
his  wife  had  in  their  rural  retirement  come  to  know 
Homer  and  Herodotus  in  the  original  —  nay,  she  had 
ventured  on  ^schylus.  During  a  stay  at  Dresden  in 
the  preceding  autumn  Humboldt  had  grown  intimate 
with  Korner,  and  had  taken  warm  interest  in  his 
a3sthetic  investigations.  Korner,  writing  to  Schiller, 
had  praised  Humboldt's  rare  familiarity  with  ancient 
literature,  his  feeling  for  excellence  in  all  departments, 
and  his  pleasant  society,  to  which  a  certain  frankness 
and  honhomie  lent  pecuhar  charm.  That  winter  Hum- 
boldt had  been  hard  at  work  on  Kant,  whose  system 
he  thought  incontrovertible,  but  to  him  also  the  "  Cri- 
tique of  the  Judgment"  seemed  to  need  not  only 
corrections  of  detail,  but  an  expansion  of  its  whole 
scheme.  Beauty  he  explained  as  the  form  of  the 
understanding  in  phenomena ;  he  was  eager  to  know 
Schiller's  present  view  and  its  demonstration.  Schiller 
could  not  help  falling  straightway  into  the  closest 
intimacy  with  one  who  revered  his  intellect,  who  was 
finely  gifted,  finely  cultured,  rich  in  ideas,  and  touched 
with  the  breath  of  Greek  genius.  Add  to  this  that 
Humboldt  spoke  of  Korner  with  a  genuine  enthusiasm 
that  always  unlocked  Schiller's  heart.  He  writes  to 
his  Dresden  friend :  "  Humboldt  is  an  acquaintance 
wonderfully  pleasant  and  likewise  profitable  to  me ; 
in  converse  with  liim  my  ideas  unfold  themselves  more 
rapidly  and  ripely.  There  is  a  wholeness  about  him 
that  I  have  rarely  seen,  and  which  I  have  found  in 
none  but  you."  The  stream  of  Humboldt's  eloquence 
would  well  out  of  his  rich  store  of  ideas  and  attain- 
ments, and  often  take  an  unexpected,  even  jocular 
turn ;  but  amid  its  smooth,  complacent  flow,  Schiller 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  359 

would  throw  in  a  shrewd  counter-observation  which 
laid  bare  what  to  his  own  deep  apprehension  was  the 
heart  of  the  matter  and  had  been  overlooked. 

Humboldt,  whom  Schiller  now  thought  much  quieter 
and  gentler,  was  his  most  valuable,  almost  his  only 
friend  at  Jena ;  for  his  connection  with  Paulus,  Schiitz, 
Hufeland,  and  Griesbach  fell  more  and  more  into  the 
background. 

Cotta,  who  on  the  27th  called  at  Jena  on  his  way 
back  from  Leipzig,  discussed  the  details  of  an  agreement 
touching  the  Universal  Journal  of  European  States 
and  the  monthly  journal  of  literature,  Die  Horcn  (The 
Hours),  both  to  be  under  Schiller's  management.  For 
the  first  he  was  to  receive  two  thousand  gulden  a  year, 
another  fifteen  hundred  if  the  sale  exceeded  six  thou- 
sand copies,  and  two  thousand  more  for  every  additional 
thousand  copies;  in  case  of  his  death,  a  respectable 
income  was  assured  to  his  widow.  The  sum  of  nine 
hundred  gulden  would  be  paid  in  advance  in  two 
equal  portions,  the  coming  June  and  September.  The 
salary  for  editing  the  Horen  was  fixed  at  one  hundred 
ducats ;  each  member  of  the  critical  committee  of  five 
was  to  receive  ten  louis  d'or,  and  those  on  the  staff 
eight,  five,  or  three  louis  d'or  at  the  committee's  discre- 
tion ;  here  also  compensation  was  granted  to  widows. 
Thus  Schiller's  future  seemed  to  be  provided  for,  even 
if  the  Copenhagen  pension  should  cease  to  come  in, 
as  it  actually  did,  no  doubt  in  consequence  of  the  fire 
that  levelled  the  Castle  of  Christiansburg  where  the 
Duke  of  Augustenburg  lived,  destroying  all  Schiller's 
letters  to  the  hereditary  prince.  No  sooner  was  Cotta 
gone,  than  the  poet's  scruples  about  undertaking  a 
pohtical  paper,  which  had  previously  arisen  in  his 
mind  but  had  been  dissipated  by  the  publisher's 
friendly  exhortations  and  liberal  offers,  revived  with 
fresh  force.  On  June  4th  he  wrote  to  Cotta  that,  upon 
consultation  with  several  men  of  weight,  he  felt  com- 


360  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

pelled  to  dissuade  him  from  the  political  journal  as  too 
perilous  an  enterprise ;  he,  at  all  events,  in  his  uncer- 
tain state  of  health,  would  not  take  the  management; 
on  the  other  hand,  the  setting  up  of  the  literary  paper 
was  unanimously  approved.  Without  waiting  for  an 
answer,  he  had  a  notice  printed  for  his  fellow  workers, 
dated  the  13th,  saying  that  the  Horen  would  commence 
with  the  following  year.  Three  allies  he  had  already 
secured,  Fichte,  Humboldt,  and  young  Woltmann,  who 
at  the  age  of  twenty-five  had  been  invited  from  Gtittin- 
gen  to  succeed  Schiller  in  the  chair  of  history.  He 
was  deeply  impressed  with  Fichte's  importance,  though 
in  his  friendship  it  was  more  the  substance  than  the 
form  that  attracted  him.  To  Goethe  the  notice  was 
sent  with  a  letter  from  Schiller,  couched  in  terms  of 
the  deepest  reverence,  and  terming  his  support  a  sure 
pledge  of  their  success.  The  company  would  gladly 
submit  to  any  conditions  that  he  might  impose,  and 
feel  infinitely  obliged  if  he  would  join  the  inner  com- 
mittee. The  same  day  Schiller  applied  to  Kant,  thank- 
fully expressing  his  joy  that  in  the  second  edition  of 
his  work  on  Religion  he  had  spoken  so  handsomely 
of  his  essay  on  "  Grace  and  Dignity "  as  "  written 
with  a  master-hand."  He  sent  the  notice  to  Gotta, 
exhorting  him  to  give  up  the  political  paper  and  con- 
centrate his  strength  upon  the  Horen :  this  journal 
would  be  infinitely  more  honourable  to  them  both, 
incomparably  less  perilous,  and  quite  as  promising. 
In  this  province  he,  Schiller,  was  a  recognised  authority, 
and  amply  furnished  with  materials ;  even  in  a  low 
state  of  health  he  could  labour  at  this  task,  for  it 
coincided  with  the  bent  of  his  mind,  with  his  inner 
vocation.  Gotta  zealously  entered  into  Schiller's  plan, 
only  he  would  have  liked  Wieland  to  join  them  and 
give  up  his  Mercur ;  but  that  periodical  was  to  him 
an  easy  source  of  income,  and  he  did  not  care  to 
relinquish  the   editorial   chair.     Schiller  himself    had 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  361 

to  bring  out  three  more  numbers  (!N'os.  4,  5,  6)  of 
the  TJicdia,  and  with  those  he  would  wind  up;  No. 
4  included  the  continuation  of  his  treatise  on  the 
Sublime. 

Goethe  had  become  acquainted  with  Fichte  and 
was  mightily  pleased  with  his  robust  and  vigorous 
nature.  What  a  different  man  from  the  shy,  uncom- 
municative Reinhold !  As  he  found  himself  more  and 
more  lonely  at  Weimar,  where  he  had  only  Meyer  and 
Voigt  for  intimate  friends,  and  was  repelled  by  Herder's 
too  exclusive  advocacy  of  the  moral  standpoint,  he 
felt  himself  drawn  to  pleasant  Jena,  distinguished  as 
it  was  by  rich  culture  and  beautiful  recollections,  and 
thus  favourable  to  poetic  composition.  Nothing,  there- 
fore, could  be  more  welcome  to  him  than  association 
with  a  man  of  Schiller's  undisputed  talent.  However, 
he  took  time  before  replying  to  the  flattering  invita- 
tion. After  ten  days  —  Fichte  had  in  the  interval 
been  to  see  him  —  he  declared  his  joyful  and  most 
hearty  wish  to  stand  by  them  in  their  literary  venture. 
A  closer  union  with  such  superior  men  would  be  sure 
to  bring  much  that  had  come  to  a  halt  with  him  into 
lively  flow  again ;  any  of  his  unpublished  things  that 
might  suit  such  a  journal,  he  would  gladly  communi- 
cate. He  hoped  soon  to  confer  orally  with  Schiller 
and  his  valued  associates  on  the  principles  that  should 
guide  them  in  the  choice  both  of  matter  and  form,  so 
as  to  give  the  journal  a  standing  above  all  others,  and 
by  its  superiority  ensure  its  living  for  at  least  a  series 
of  years. 

Three  weeks  after  Schiller's  return,  poor  Burger  died, 
to  whom  his  trenchant  review  had  given  such  infinite 
pain.  Matthisson,  who  had  seen  the  poet  a  httle 
before  his  end,  now  visited  Schiller.  The  man  he  had 
left  wasted  away  six  months  before,  he  found  "  fresh 
and  blooming,  like  a  Greek  hero  arming  for  the  Olym- 
pic style."     He  was  rejoiced  to  hear  that  he  had  never 


362  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

worked  with  brisker  courage  or  brighter  energy ;  he 
talked  of  his  "  Knights  of  Malta  "  which  he  was  think- 
ing out,  and  the  new  scheme  of  the  Uorcn.  Mat- 
thisson's  poems  had  been  sent  him  to  review  for  the 
LiUratur  Zeitung.  In  his  room  stood  casts  from  an- 
tiques ;  on  his  table  was  spread  out  a  map  of  Eome. 
Soon  after  Burger's  death,  Schiller  wrote  to  the  pub- 
lisher of  the  "  Gottingen  Museualmauach,"  offering  to 
take  the  editorship.  On  behalf  of  the  Horen  he  applied 
first  to  Engel  and  Garve,  as  Herder  was  away  on  a 
journey  ;  he  did  not  sohcit  his  aid  until  July  4th,  after 
the  other  two  had  joined. 

As  he  purposed  rewriting  for  the  Horen  his  "  Letters 
to  the  Hereditary  Prince  of  Augustenburg,"  he  buried 
himself  once  more  in  Kant ;  and  here  the  conversa- 
tion of  Humboldt  and  of  Fichte,  who  was  carrying  his 
"  Doctrine  of  Science "  through  the  press,  proved  of 
the  greatest  service.  Even  when  the  spasms  brought 
on  by  the  great  heat  deprived  him  of  sleep  and  almost 
unfitted  him  for  work,  he  toiled  manfully  on  with  Kant, 
and  had  the  pleasure  of  finding  it  grow  clearer  to  him 
every  day. 

It  was  not  till  July  21st  that  Goethe  was  able  to 
visit  Jena,  where  the  new  friends  found  an  agreement 
in  their  ideas  on  Art,  all  the  more  the  unexpected  as 
they  had  set  out  from  such  different  points  of  view. 
"  Each  of  us  could  give  the  other  something  that  he 
lacked  and  get  something  in  return,"  was  Schiller's 
report  to  Korner ;  and  Goethe  told  Meyer  that  he  had 
not  for  a  long  time  had  such  an  intellectual  treat.  The 
hopes  held  out  of  a  speedy  repetition  of  the  visit  were 
neutralised  by  a  journey  which  Goethe  had  to  take  in 
company  with  the  duke  to  Dessau,  Leipzig,  and  Dres- 
den. Schiller's  health  was  so  bad  that  for  the  first 
three  weeks  in  August  he  could  not  leave  the  house. 
As  the  pubhsher  of  the  "  Gottingen  Musenalmanach  " 
had  already  fixed  on  another  editor,  it  gave  Schiller  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  363 

more  pleasure,  when  a  young  bookseller,  Michaelis  of 
Neu-Strelitz,  who  was  at  Jena  looking  about  for  good 
copyrights,  undertook  a  new  "  Museualmanach,"  to  come 
out  yearly  under  his,  Schiller's  direction,  commencing 
with  the  autumn  of  1795.  According  to  their  agree- 
ment of  August  15th,  Schiller  was  to  get  three  hun- 
dred thalers;  the  price  of  all  the  poems  was  not  to 
exceed  150  thalers.  The  continuance  of  his  spasms 
compelled  him  to  decline  a  meeting  with  Korner  at 
Leipzig ;  he  could  only  venture  as  far  as  Weiszenfels. 
He  first  wound  up  the  Thalia  (the  last  two  numbers 
had  nothing  of  his  but  "  Stray  Thoughts  on  Sundry 
Subjects  in  Esthetics"),  and  finished  his  review  of 
"  Matthisson's  Poems."  Here,  starting  from  the  nature 
of  painting  and  poetry,  he  assigned  to  the  landscape- 
painter  and  landscape-poet  their  exact  position,  and 
showed  how  happily  Matthisson  satisfied  the  three 
requirements  in  the  depicting  of  landscape.  At  the 
same  time  he  did  justice  to  his  attempts  in  other  prov- 
inces of  poetic  art.  This  encomium,  overflowing  with 
the  kindliest  appreciation,  stood  in  sharp  contrast  with 
his  severe  critique  of  Burger,  though  Schiller  took  care 
to  mention  that  Matthisson  has  as  yet  but  proved  his 
pinions  within  a  modest  circle.  The  author  was  now 
formally  invited  to  join  the  staff  of  the  Horen.  Before 
setting  out,  Schiller  wrote  a  letter  to  Goethe,  dictated 
by  heartfelt  reverence  and  the  need  there  was  of  their 
intimate  union  and  joint  action. 

The  day  and  a  half  at  Weiszenfels  showed  the 
friends  anew  how  well  they  understood  one  another, 
and  how  necessary  each  was  to  the  other.  Schiller, 
on  his  return,  found  a  most  cordial  letter  from  Goethe, 
who  wished  to  be  enlightened  on  the  stages  of  thought 
that  Schiller  had  passed  through  during  those  last  few 
years :  so  httle  had  he  kept  pace  with  his  aesthetic 
labours.  And  he  sent  his  new  confederate  an  early 
essay  of  his  own,  in  which  he  had  applied  his  defini- 


364  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

tion  of  Beauty  as  "  Perfection  with  Freedom  "  to  organic 
nature.  Schiller  transmitted  to  him  his  MS.  researches 
on  Beauty  in  which  he  had  fixed  upon  Freedom  and 
law  in  Art  as  conditions  of  the  Beautiful;  but  his 
ideas  had  since  acquired  a  better  foundation  and  greater 
distinctness  which  could  hardly  fail  to  bring  them  ever 
so  much  nearer  to  Goethe's.  Persuaded  that  on  all 
essential  points  they  were  at  one,  Goethe  begged  him 
during  the  fortnight  that  the  court  was  away,  to  come 
and  stay  at  his  house :  he  should  follow  his  own  mode 
of  life  entirely  and  make  himself  at  home.  This  invi- 
tation, as  kind  as  it  was  unexpected,  Schiller  gladly 
accepted.  His  wife  was  away  at  Eudolstadt.  Caro- 
Hne's  divorce  had  at  last  been  effected,  and  her  union 
with  Wolzogen  was  to  follow  ;  at  this  Schiller  was  very 
much  put  out,  for  he  did  not  believe  their  characters 
were  suited  to  each  other.  He  was  then  thinking 
over  his  development  of  the  Naive ;  he  also  wanted  to 
go  on  with  the  plot  of  "  Wallenstein."  But  over  this 
he  fell  into  dreadful  anxiety  and  fear;  he  even  began 
to  doubt  his  vocation  as  a  poet ;  this,  however,  proved 
but  a  passing  mood.  That  very  essay  on  the  Naive, 
written  with  full  relish  and  from  the  heart,  he  came  to 
regard  as  a  bridge  to  poetic  composition.  In  rewriting 
his  Letter  to  the  Hereditary  Prince,  he  tried  to  give  it 
the  utmost  perfection,  and  thought  he  succeeded. 
Goethe,  through  Frau  von  Stein,  caused  a  writing-desk 
to  be  conveyed  to  Schiller,  who  was  to  place  it  in  the 
apartment  of  his  absent  wife.  "  A  kind  friend  to  both 
of  you  entrusted  me  with  the  commission  "  was  what 
the  lady  wrote,  in  sending  it  on.  Goethe  took  this 
graceful  way  of  showing  how  much  he  desired  a  union 
of  real  friendship  with  Schiller. 

From  September  14th  to  the  27th  the  newly  alhed 
poets  luxuriated  in  the  freest  interchange  of  thoughts. 
Even  in  body  Schiller  felt  a  great  deal  better.  Whereas 
at  home  he  could  not  rest  at  night  for  the  spasms,  here 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  365 

he  slept  well,  which  he  ascribed  to  his  total  abstinence 
from  coffee,  tea,  and  fruit,  and  to  good  suppers,  at 
which  he  drank  wine  instead  of  beer ;  even  vegetables 
he  ate  for  dinner  and  supper,  and  felt  none  the  worse. 
He  was  not  indeed  free  from  spasms  in  the  daytime, 
and  therefore  could  pay  no  visits ;  he  only  walked  out 
in  the  park  with  Goethe.  Once  he  missed  seeing 
Frau  von  Stein,  being  hardly  able  to  get  back  to 
Goethe's  house  for  the  pain.  He  spent  the  greater 
part  of  each  day  in  the  society  of  his  one  friend,  once 
from  half-past  eleven  in  the  morning  until  eleven  at 
night.  All  that  either  of  them  contemplated  doing 
was  discussed  in  detail  without  any  reserve.  Goethe 
put  him  into  such  good  humour  with  his  "  Knights  of 
Malta"  again,  that  he  thought  it  possible  to  bring  it 
on  the  stage  by  the  next  birthday  of  the  duchess. 
*'  He  read  me  his  '  Elegies,'  which  are  somewhat  wanton 
and  not  overdecent,  and  yet  are  among  the  finest 
things  he  ever  did,"  writes  Schiller  to  his  wife.  "  He 
has  asked  me  to  correct  his  '  Egmont '  for  the  Weimar 
theatre,  because  he  dare  not  do  it  himself ;  and  so  I 
shall.  He  advised  me,  too,  to  put  some  touches  to 
my  '  Fiesco '  and  '  Plot  and  Passion,'  so  that  they 
may  keep  lasting  hold  of  the  stage."  Humboldt,  who 
had  gone  with  him  to  Goethe's,  now  paid  them  a  visit. 
Herder  had  invited  Schiller,  but,  as  illness  kept  him 
back,  came  himself  to  see  him.  It  was  at  Weimar, 
too,  that  he  received  a  reminder  from  Cotta  to  have 
everything  in  readiness  for  the  punctual  appearance 
of  the  announcement  and  the  first  number  of  the  Horen, 
for  Schiller  had  once  more  been  seriously  urging  on 
him  the  great  cost  of  the  venture,  which  would  prob- 
ably repay  his  expenses  only  after  a  sale  of  thirteen 
hundred  copies.  So  little  was  Cotta  alarmed  at  this, 
that  he  was  in  treaty  with  Professor  Posselt  to  take  up 
the  political  paper  also.  His  proposal  to  Schiller  to  take 
at  least  some  part  in  it  was  now  decidedly  rejected. 


366  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

During  tliis  time  Schiller  had  been  producing  noth- 
ing, but  he  had  been  gathering  courage  and  zest  for  a 
stirring  life,  being  assured  of  Goethe's  hearty  and  har- 
monious cooperation,  not  only  in  the  Horen  —  about 
which  he  was  more  enthusiastic,  almost,  than  Schiller 
himself  —  but  in  every  work  and  effort.  His  boldest 
dreams  were  realised ;  the  poet  whose  greatness  had 
once  reduced  him  to  envying  despair  stood  by  his  side 
as  truest  ally  in  the  contest  for  ideal  perfection  in  Art. 
On  returning  home,  having  apparently  talked  it  over 
with  Goethe,  he  tried  to  induce  Schiitz  to  insert 
promptly  in  his  Literatur  Zeitung,  by  some  of  his  own 
staff,  fuU  notices  of  every  article  in  the  Horen.  Goethe 
knew  but  too  well  how  malice,  once  raising  its  voice 
in  so  important  a  periodical,  could  damage  the  best 
enterprise,  and  how  easily  literary  men  might  be  in- 
duced to  pass  scandalously  unfair  judgments ;  he  was 
therefore  anxious  at  once  to  stop  this  sorry  business  at 
the  source.  As  Schiller  could  not  go  out  for  the  bad 
weather,  Schiitz  himself  called  upon  him,  and  they 
came  to  an  understanding  which,  it  is  true,  was  after- 
ward modified.  A  correspondence  of  the  highest  in- 
terest united  the  new  friends.  Goethe  sent  what 
matter  he  had  by  him  and  promised  more.  Schiller 
kept  on  at  his  letters  "  On  the  Esthetic  Education  of 
Man,"  with  which  the  Horen  was  to  open ;  what 
Goethe  saw  of  them  he  thought  exquisite.  Unhappily, 
Schiller  was  prevented  from  coming  over  to  see  the 
performance  of  his  "Don  Carlos,"  on  the  16th,  under 
Goethe's  most  careful  superintendence. 

On  November  2d  Goethe  hastened  to  Jena  for  a  few 
days  with  his  art-loving  friend  Meyer :  many  arrange- 
ments were  made  about  the  Horen,  Goethe  promising 
his  "  Entertainments,"  Meyer  his  "  Notes  on  Ancient 
Art."  A  month  later  Schiller  drew  up  his  official 
prospectus  of  the  Horen.  It  stated  that  the  new 
journal,  while  forbidding  all  reference  to  the  present 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  367 

course  of  events  or  the  immediate  expectations  of 
mankind,  would  question  History  on  the  past  of  the 
world  and  Philosophy  on  the  future ;  it  would  labour 
with  all  its  might  at  the  silent  building  up  of  better 
beUefs,  purer  principles,  nobler  manners,  on  which  any 
true  amehoration  of  our  social  state  must  ultimately 
hang.  In  sport  as  well  as  earnest,  it  would  pursue 
one  single  aim,  that  of  making  Beauty  mediatress  of 
Truth,  and  through  Truth  securing  to  Beauty  an  en- 
during basis  and  a  higher  dignity.  It  would,  so  far  as 
no  dearer  interest  suffered  by  it,  aim  at  variety  and 
novelty,  but  would  set  its  face  against  the  frivolous 
taste  that  sought  the  new  for  novelty's  sake  alone ;  at 
the  same  time  it  would  claim  every  hberty  compatible 
with  good  and  fine  morals.  The  editor  felt  a  patriotic 
joy  that  he  should  have  succeeded  at  length  in  uniting 
several  of  the  worthiest  writers  of  Germany  in  the 
performance  of  one  continuous  task ;  a  thing  which 
the  nation,  notwithstanding  all  attempts  hitherto  made 
by  individuals,  had  always  lacked,  and  could  not  but 
lack  because  such  a  number  and  such  a  choice  of  con- 
tributors was  the  one  thing  needed  to  combine,  in 
a  work  coming  out  at  stated  times,  excellence  in  parts 
with  variety  in  the  whole.  The  number  of  the  con- 
tributors named  was  twenty-five ;  among  them  were 
Gleim,  Pfeffel,  and  Biirger's  friend,  A.  W.  Schlegel, 
then  Hofmeister  at  Amsterdam. 

Alas !  directly  on  the  back  of  this  high-flown  pro- 
spectus came  trouble.  Schiller  himself  was  not  quite 
satisfied  with  the  opening  piece,  excellent  in  its  kind, 
of  Goethe's  "  Entertainments."  And  his  own  "  Letters," 
he  was  forced  to  acknowledge,  were  "  not  altogether 
easy  to  understand,"  though  he  thought  much  of  their 
scientific  value,  as,  in  them,  his  system  approached 
a  ripeness  and  inner  consistency  that  would  make  it 
enduring ;  and  a  simplicity  reigned  through  the  whole, 
of  which  he  himself  found  evidence  in  the  increased 


368  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

facility  of  execution.  In  spite  of  his  perpetual  spasms, 
he  had  seldom  felt  so  well  in  heart  and  mind.  Then, 
in  his  home,  his  lot  was  of  the  happiest.  His  Karl 
was,  to  his  joy,  both  hearty  and  healthy,  racing  merrily 
round  the  room.  He  was  delighted  with  the  httle 
fellow's  first  attempts  at  speech.  "  As  soon  as  I  am 
up,  I  receive  a  visit  from  him.  He  dines  at  the  same 
table  with  us,  and  we  have  a  good  time  together  of 
an  evening.  I  cannot  express  how  much  the  child 
is  to  me." 

His  "  Esthetic  Letters,"  as  they  went  on,  seemed  to 
him  the  best  thing  he  had  done  or  ever  could  produce. 
But  when  he  read  the  first  volume  of  Goethe's  "  Wil- 
helm  Meister,"  his  old  passion  for  poetry  revived.  The 
poet,  he  said,  was  after  all  the  one  real  man ;  even  the 
best  philosopher  was  but  a  caricature  to  him.  It  was 
only  when  Goethe  and  Meyer,  on  January  11,  1795, 
came  to  Jena,  and  seemed  vehemently  carried  away 
by  his  reading  of  the  "  Letters,"  that  he  felt  comforted 
and  encouraged  to  go  on.  In  January,  to  his  great 
delight,  about  a  thousand  orders  for  the  Horen  had 
come  in.  He  now  meant  to  give  himself  up  to  it 
entirely,  only  devoting  some  six  weeks  to  writing  two 
or  three  poems  for  the  "  Almanach."  The  Litcratur 
Zeihmg  promptly  enough  brought  out  a  review  of  the 
first  article  by  Schutz  himself,  which  Schiller  thought 
passable,  but  wofully  wanting  in  insight ;  he  even 
fancied  Schutz  had  a  spite  against  him. 

In  February  he  zealously  devoted  himself  to  review- 
ing the  still  unprinted  third  and  fourth  volumes  of 
Goethe's  "  Willielm  Meister."  Repeated  attacks  of  his 
malady  forbade  his  accepting  the  author's  invitation 
to  Weimar.  As  the  need  of  variety  called  for  some- 
thing in  the  way  of  narrative  in  the  Horen,  and  no 
interesting  article  had  been  sent  in  from  any  other 
quarter,  he  left  the  "  /Esthetic  Letters,"  at  which  he 
was  working  with  such  relish,  to  do  a  description  of 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  369 

the  siege  of  Antwerp,  which  would  come  easy  to  him. 
In  the  meantime,  friend  Abel  of  Tiibingen  had  been 
commissioned  to  sound  him  as  to  whether  he  would 
accept  the  professorship  of  higher  philology  and  es- 
thetics there.  Upon  his  refusal,  Abel,  on  March  3d, 
held  out  the  prospect  of  a  chair  of  history  and 
sesthetics :  he  should  be  at  hberty  to  lecture  in  his 
own  house,  and  be  exempt  from  all  public  business. 
Of  this  renewed  offer  Schiller  availed  himself  to  obtain 
from  his  own  duke  a  promise  to  double  his  salary  in 
case  he  became  unfit  for  hterary  work.  Then,  on 
April  3d,  he  for  the  second  time  declined  the  flatter- 
ing offer,  with  the  remark  that  he  would  have  given 
them  too  little  in  return  for  the  thousand  gulden, 
under  which  he  could  not  hve  at  Tubingen.  And  how 
could  he  now  have  parted  with  Goethe  and  Hum- 
boldt ! 

Goethe  had  now  returned  to  Jena,  where  for  five 
weeks  he  hved  in  the  closest  intimacy  with  Schiller, 
coming  to  see  him  every  evening.  On  April  13th 
Schiller  moved  into  more  spacious  lodgings  in  Gries- 
bach's  large  house  on  the  Stadtgraben ;  but  there  he 
immediately  took  violent  cold.  During  this  time, 
when  Lotte  too  was  ailing,  Goethe's  presence  was  as 
an  elixir  to  him.  Humboldt's  had  been  almost  the 
only  society  he  greatly  cared  for ;  as  to  their  well- 
meaning  but  overofficious  landlady,  Lotte  always  kept 
her  at  arm's  length ;  and  Griesbach  himself  lived  in 
another  mental  sphere.  The  continuation  of  "  Wilhelm 
Meister,"  the  "  Prometheus  Unbound,"  which  Goethe 
had  just  begun  in  the  old  Greek  style,  the  contribu- 
tions to  the  Horen  and  the  "  Almanach  "  that  should 
come  out  in  the  autumn,  furnished  fruitful  topics  of 
the   most  quickening  conversation. 

Gotta  brought  the  best  of  news  from  Leipzig  fair ;  the 
circulation  of  the  Horen  was  not  far  short  of  eighteen 
hundred,   and    he    testified    his    acknowledgments   to 


370  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Schiller  by  a  gift  of  thirty-one  Carolines.  He  asked 
indeed  for  more  variety  in  the  articles,  and  did  not 
conceal  how  people  grumbled  at  the  abstruseness  of 
the  subjects ;  but  Goethe  thought  they  should  just  give 
what  they  could,  and  snap  their  fingers  at  the  public. 
Schiller  now  ventured  to  insert  even  Goethe's  Roman 
"  Elegies  "  (leaving  out  two),  though  he  could  not  but 
foresee  that  they  would  give  a  great  deal  of  offence. 
His  own  aesthetic  feeling  feasted  on  these  finished  pro- 
ductions, which  present,  said  he,  the  whole  Man,  in 
whom  sensuous  enjoyment  is  but  a  necessary  comple- 
ment of  his  being,  not  a  low  craving  of  sensuality. 
The  same  number  contained,  in  continuation  of  the 
"  Esthetic  Letters,"  a  treatise  on  "  Beauty  That  Melts  ; " 
its  counterpart,  on  "  Beauty  That  Braces,"  was  reserved 
for  a  separate  and  choicely  printed  edition  of  this,  his 
master-work.  Unfortunately,  during  the  bad  weather 
in  the  second  week  of  May,  he  suffered  severely,  and 
the  preparation  of  the  "  Letters  "  distressed  him.  Then, 
too,  Lotte  was  taken  ill  with  measles,  by  which  he 
saw  himself  cut  off  from  Humboldt  and  his  house. 
The  more  delightful  was  a  visit  of  eleven  days  from 
Goethe ;  but  at  the  end  of  it  he  was  seized  with  a 
fever  which  prostrated  him  for  some  considerable 
time. 

With  his  dehcate  and  graceful,  nay  dramatic  re- 
writing of  the  "  Letters,"  Sehdler  had  for  the  present 
done  his  share  of  work  in  the  Horcn.  With  convinc- 
ing clearness  he  unfolded  the  thought  which  had 
dawned  on  him  so  brightly :  that  Beauty  is  the  highest 
and  last  satisfaction  of  what  he  called  the  Play-im- 
pulse, and  that  the  ^Esthetic  temper  of  mind  consists 
in  freedom  of  determination ;  that  Beauty  helps  out 
the  imperfection  of  human  nature,  calms,  soothes,  and 
melts  us  when  highly  strung,  raising  and  animating 
us  when  unstrung ;  that  ^Esthetic  culture  brings  Moral 
with  it,  and  that  he  alone  needs  the  Moral  who  is 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  371 

incapable  of  the  Esthetic.  Though,  in  doing  this,  he 
had  broken  alike  with  the  Empirical  and  with  the 
Rational  school,  Kant  had  declared  himself  quite  satis- 
fied with  the  first  part  of  the  "  Letters ; "  and  Schiller 
himself  felt  that  he  had  made  a  great  advance ;  he 
even  thought  his  view  was  strictly  demonstrated.  He 
found  it  hard,  now,  to  turn  from  philosophic  to  poetic 
composition,  of  a  kind  needed  by  the  "  Almanach ; "  and 
his  ill-health  aggravated  the  difficulty.  He  tried  his 
hand  on  a  rhymed  epistle ;  then  he  threw  it  aside  as 
not  up  to  the  mark.  To  supply  the  needs  of  the 
Horen,  he  had  had  recourse  to  Fichte,  who  was  stay- 
ing that  summer  at  Osmannstadt,  hard  by.  Personally 
he  was  no  admirer  of  the  great  "  I  of  Osmannstadt," 
with  whom,  he  said,  "  the  richest  fountain  of  absurdi- 
ties had  been  drained  dry."  He  had  always  missed 
in  him  the  due  degree  of  worldly  wdsdom.  At  his 
pressing  request,  Fichte  sent  the  first  part  of  his  three 
Letters  "  On  the  Spu'it  and  the  Letter  in  Philosophy." 
Schiller,  thinking  he  saw  in  it  an  attack  upon  his  own 
"  ^Esthetic  Letters,"  felt  bitterly  provoked,  and,  after  a 
hurried  reading,  sent  it  back  with  the  rudest  com- 
ments, as  unfit  for  his  monthly  journal.  He  objected 
to  the  dry,  heavyj  often  confused  style  of  exposition, 
declared  he  was  neither  satisfied  with  the  matter  nor 
with  the  dress,  and  even  tried  to  show  that,  being 
worked  on  an  eccentric  plan,  it  wanted  clearness  and 
point.  Fichte,  whom  such  schoolboy  treatment  could 
not  but  offend,  calmly  but  decidedly  repelled  the 
charges  of  shallowness  and  unintelligibility.  Of  Schil- 
ler's own  philosophical  works,  he  maintained  that  they 
wearied  the  reader,  because  he  would  compel  the 
imagination,  which  ought  to  be  free,  to  tliiiik ;  men 
admired  them,  stared  at  them,  but  did  not  understand 
them.  Between  the  dates  of  their  two  letters,  came 
Goethe's  brief  sojourn  at  Jena,  on  his  way  to  Karlsbad. 
Humboldt  had  been  called  away  to  Berhn  at  the  begin- 


372  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

niiig  of  July,  to  see  his  sick  mother ;  and  by  the 
absence  of  these  two,  Schiller  found  himself  isolated 
for  a  good  while.  He  writes  to  Kcirner :  "  I  am  h\dng 
quite  cavcdierement,  for  I  am  making  poems  for  my 
'  Musenalmanach ;'  and  I  seem  stupid  enough  over 
it."  And  the  worst  was,  his  spasms  came  on  with 
such  violence  that  he  could  hardly  set  pen  to  paper. 
As  late  as  the  20  th,  he  had  not  finished  the  third 
poem  for  the  "  Almanach  ; "  yet,  in  spite  of  suffering,  he 
was  soon  to  feel  strong  stimulus  for  poetry,  for  at  the 
very  times  when  his  body  was  racked,  his  mind  was 
most  active,  whereas,  when  in  a  comfortable  state  of 
health,  he  took  things  easily.  On  August  3d  he  was 
able  to  inform  Korner  that,  in  spite  of  physical  suffer- 
ing, something  had  been  achieved  that  gave  him  confi- 
dence. "  'Tis  true,  my  time  for  this  work  being  cut 
too  close,  I  have  not  ventured  out  on  the  high  seas, 
but  have  been  skirting  the  coasts  of  philosophy ;  yet 
I  have  thereby  achieved  the  transition  at  least  to  freer 
invention.  To  all  appearance  I  am  likely  to  remain 
the  rest  of  the  year,  perhaps  the  whole  winter,  in 
the  poetic  field."  In  addition  to  several  SpriicJie  or 
Apophthegms,  he  had  finished  his  "  Might  of  Song,"  his 
humourous  "  Pegasus  in  Harness,"  and  the  "  Dance " 
so  distinguished  by  imitative  rhythm. 

At  the  same  time  he  was  trying  to  vindicate  his 
"  Esthetic  Letters  "  from  Fichte's  depreciation,  were  it 
only  to  his  own  mind ;  as  a  letter  for  which  I  have 
lying  before  me  some  remarkable  notes  (of  August  3d 
or  4th)  seems  never  to  have  been  sent.  In  these  he 
remarks,  that  while  it  cannot  be  indifferent  to  an 
author  whether  a  large  public  buys  him  or  a  small, 
he  ought  not  to  enlist  readers  by  cringing  to  the  spirit 
of  the  age,  but  ought  by  bold  assertion  of  his  own 
views  to  startle  them,  put  them  on  the  stretch,  give 
them  a  shaking.  To  Fichte's  appeal  to  what  the  public 
verdict  on  them  both  would  be  in  ten  years'  time,  he 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  373 

answers :  "  That  in  a  hundred  or  two  hundred  years' 
time,  when  new  revolutions  have  passed  over  philosophic 
thought,  your  writings  may  be  quoted  and  appraised 
at  their  worth,  but  will  no  longer  be  read  hes  just  as 
much  in  the  nature  of  the  case  as  it  does  that  mine 
will  then  be  read,  not  more,  it  may  be,  but  also  not 
less,  than  now.  And  what  may  the  reason  be  ?  This  : 
that  writings  whose  only  value  lies  in  the  results  they 
yield  to  the  understanding,  were  these  never  so  pre- 
cious, will  with  time  grow  valueless,  in  proportion  as 
the  understanding  grows  indifferent  to  those  results,  or 
finds  shorter  roads  to  them ;  on  the  contrary,  writings 
that,  apart  from  their  logical  import,  produce  an 
(artistic)  effect,  that  bear  the  Hving  impress  of  an 
individual,  these  can  never  lose  their  value,  but  have 
in  them  an  indestructible  principle  of  life,  because  an 
individual  is  unique,  unreplaceable,  and  not  to  be  ex- 
hausted." Of  his  own  style  of  statement  he  says : 
"  My  constant  endeavour  is,  in  conjunction  with  the 
act  of  research,  to  employ  the  whole  of  the  mental 
powers  and  as  far  as  may  be,  to  work  upon  them 
all  alike.  I  want,  therefore,  not  only  to  make  my 
thoughts  intelligible  to  another,  but  to  impart  to  him 
my  whole  soul  and  work  upon  his  sensuous  no  less 
than  his  spiritual  powers." 

His  lyric  muse  now  took  a  higher  fhght,  first  of  all 
in  his  "  Kealm  of  Shadows,"  afterward,  in  a  consider- 
ably altered  shape,  entitled  "  The  Ideal  and  Life."  In 
this  he  beheved  he  had  reached  the  utmost  hmit 
of  thought-poetry.  He  joyfully  recognised  how  im- 
mensely precision  of  thought  aids  the  action  of  the 
imagination.  The  same  August  was  to  yield  him 
quite  a  rich  crop  of  other  poems  besides,  some  of 
them  important ;  for  instance,  the  infinitely  touching 
"  Ideals."  But  the  passionate  pursuit  of  poetry  af- 
fected his  health.  On  the  29th  he  writes  to  Goethe : 
"  My  health  does  not  get  on  much  better  yet.     I  fear 


374  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

I  have  to  do  penance  for  the  violent  commotions  into 
which  my  poetising  threw  me.  Half  the  man  is 
enough  for  philosophising,  and  the  other  half  can  be 
resting ;  but  your  muses  suck  one  dry."  Directly 
after  this  he  was  gladdened  by  the  second  remittance 
of  his  Copenhagen  pension,  which  had  stood  over  from 
the  previous  year ;  he  received  four  hundred  thalers 
vid  Hamburg. 

As  the  "  Almanach "  was  to  be  printed  at  Berlin, 
Schiller  had  sent  his  MS.  there,  to  Humboldt ;  but 
to  his  vexation  the  publisher  could  not  be  heard  of. 
In  his  first  zeal  he  wished  to  have  it  printed,  all  the 
same ;  then  he  thought  of  withdrawing  it  and  of  using 
the  poems  for  the  Horen,  when  in  the  nick  of  time  the 
publisher  made  his  appearance.  Though  Schiller  liad 
already  assigned  a  portion  of  the  poems  to  his  monthly, 
there  was  yet  a  considerable  number  left  for  the 
"  Almanach."  Goethe,  in  addition  to  his  batch  of  Ve- 
netian Epigrams,  had  contributed  some  stray  pieces ; 
Herder,  a  good  many  under  various  signatures,  and 
other  poets,  other  things  ;  so  that  the  new  "  Almanach  " 
stood  very  notably  conspicuous  among  its  three  rivals, 
the  Gcittingen,  the  Berlin,  and  Voss's. 

But  now  Schiller  had  to  devote  all  his  energy  to 
the  Horen  again,  especially  to  the  last  numbers  in  the 
year,  in  order,  by  attractive  matter,  to  retain  wavering 
subscribers,  if  possible  to  catch  new  ones,  or  at  all 
events,  in  the  worst  case,  to  finish  with  credit.  The 
jaded  taste  of  the  reading  world,  ever  craving  light 
and  amusing  matter,  made  the  Horen  such  a  burden 
to  him  that  he  often  lost  heart  altogether ;  and  then 
Humboldt  and  Goethe  would  cheer  him  up  by  appeal- 
ing to  its  intrinsic  worth  and  his  approving  conscience. 
Nevertheless  he  determined  now  to  adopt  as  intelhgible 
a  style  as  possible,  and  he  tried  to  induce  the  best  of 
his  fellow  workers  to  do  the  same.  In  that  spirit  he 
wrote  for  No.  9  the  essay  "  On  the  Necessary  Limits 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  375 

of  the  Beautiful,"  especially  iu  propounding  philosophic 
truth,  prompted  apparently  by  his  quarrel  with  Fichte. 
"  But  if,"  he  writes  to  Cotta,  "  but  if,  notwithstanding 
all  these  efforts,  the  public  voice  be  against  us,  then 
the  enterprise  must  be  given  up.  It  is  impossible  for 
me  to  keep  fencing  long  with  stupidity  and  bad  taste ; 
the  pleasure  and  the  confidence  I  feel  in  my  work 
is  the  very  soul  of  it."  His  correspondent  would  not 
hear  a  word  of  giving  up,  even  if  the  next  year  showed, 
what  there  was  no  great  reason  to  fear,  a  marked  fall- 
ing off  in  the  sale.  No,  Schiller  must  on  no  account 
lose  his  hking  for  the  monthly.  And  for  money  he 
was  to  draw  on  Cotta  whenever  he  pleased.  In  the 
beginning  of  September  Schiller  wrote  an  important 
essay  on  the  "  Nai've,"  a  subject  he  had  already 
handled  two  years  before  when  in  Suabia ;  and  a 
work  written  at  that  earlier  date  on  the  Dangers  of 
-Esthetic  Manners  was  now  printed  with  hardly  any 
alteration.  His  exposition  of  the  Na'ive  he  wrote  with 
more  freedom  and  ease  than  the  Esthetic  Letters. 
But  while  so  engaged,  he  was  seized  anew  with  the 
spirit  of  poetry,  and  wrote  the  elegy,  afterward  known 
as  "  The  Walk,"  which  of  all  his  poems  he  considered 
the  most  poetical,  and  likewise  a  distinct  advance 
in  poetic  power.  He  then  thought  of  attempting  a 
romantic  tale,  so  as  to  complete  the  whole  round  of 
poetic  modes  and  forms,  since  the  public  seemed  struck 
with  the  vast  variety  of  his  compositions,  as  one  of 
the  distinctive  attributes  of  his  genius.  He  took  his 
materials  from  a  love-affair  of  Chancellor  Schlick  with 
a  fair  Sienese,  in  the  Italian  campaign  of  Sigismund, 
though  he  was  obliged  to  give  the  story  a  different 
turn.  But  a  restless  longing  drove  him  to  his 
"  Knights  of  Malta "  again :  he  thought  that  in  the 
four  months,  beginning  with  December,  during  which 
he  hoped  to  be  free  from  the  Horen,  he  might  get  far 
on  with  it,  if  he  did  not  finish  it.     "At  times  I  feel 


376  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

rather  sanguine  about  it,"  he  writes  to  Humboldt,  "  and 
with  such  a  subject,  too,  I  ought  least  of  all  to  fail. 
As  the  parts  are  linked  together  by  choruses,  it  fits  all 
the  better  with  my  present  lyric  mood.  The  action  is 
simple  and  heroic,  the  characters  to  match,  and  those 
all  male ;  it  is,  moreover,  the  embodiment  of  a  sublime 
idea,  such  as  I  love."  Let  Humboldt  thoroughly  sift 
the  question  once  more  whether  he  ought  to  decide  for 
epic  or  dramatic  poetry.  Not  long  before  he  had  com- 
missioned Ktirner  to  say  to  what  department  of  poetry 
he  should  now  attach  himself.  While  Humboldt's, 
Kcirner's,  Goethe's,  and  Herder's  verdicts  on  his  recent 
poems  roused  and  elevated  him,  he  was  wishing  all  the 
while  to  hear  his  friends  echo  his  own  feeling  that 
the  true  field  for  him  was  tragedy. 

Kept  a  prisoner  all  through  the  summer,  he  felt 
fresh  life  in  the  soft  autumn  days  of  mid -October, 
and  he  drove  out  for  the  first  time  on  the  10  th.  Be- 
fore he  could  turn  to  his  "  Knights,"  there  were  six 
weeks  to  be  given  up  to  the  Horen.  Just  then  the 
journal  suffered  several  sharp  attacks ;  and  on  the 
30th,  while  his  resentment  was  fresh,  he  wrote  to 
Cotta  that  in  the  next  number  he  would  give  a  gen- 
eral reply  to  all  the  wretched  criticisms.  But  the  very 
next  day  he  thought,  in  opposition  to  Goethe,  that 
there  was  still  room  for  question  whether  they  ought 
to  take  any  notice  of  these  platitudes :  he  would  rather 
make  a  conspicuous  display  of  his  indifference  to  them. 
A  visit  from  Goethe,  who  stayed  from  November  5th 
to  the  11th,  was  most  refreshing  to  him;  it  was  the 
first  time  he  had  kept  his  birthday  with  him.  "  We 
sit  together  talking  from  five  in  the  evening  till  twelve, 
and  even  one,"  he  tells  Humboldt.  Goethe  was  then 
making  a  particular  study  of  architecture  in  prepara- 
tion for  his  journey  to  Italy,  intending  the  next  year 
to  follow  Meyer,  who  had  recently  started  for  the 
south.     This  was  very  painful  to  Schiller,  but  the  stay 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  377 

should  not  last  longer  than  a  year.  Goethe's  solid 
method  of  taking  the  law  from  the  concrete  object, 
and  from  the  nature  of  the  case  deducing  the  rules, 
made  it  easy  for  Schiller  to  grasp  his  view  of  building 
as  a  fine  art.  His  theory  of  colours,  too,  his  views  of 
natural  science,  were  on  the  same  lines.  His  conver- 
sation on  Greek  literature  and  art  had  such  stirring 
effect  upon  Schiller  that  he  seriously  determined  to 
study  Greek.  Yet  to  this  it  never  came.  He  threw 
himself,  heart  and  soul,  into  what  was  a  sequel  to  his 
essay  on  the  Naive,  viz.  his  treatise  on  the  Poets  of 
Eefiection ;  for,  according  to  the  two  modes  of  feeling. 
Naive  and  Eeflective,  he  divided  the  whole  field  of  poesy 
into  these  two  provinces.  The  Na'ive  poet  can  only 
stand  in  one  single  relation  to  his  subject;  not  so  the 
Eeflective.  Accordingly,  Schiller  made  out  that  there 
were  three  distinct  modes  of  composition,  the  satiric, 
elegiac,  and  idyllic,  by  which  he  did  not  at  all  mean 
to  set  aside  the  ordinary  classification  according  to 
form  of  composition.  Schiller  makes  the  Na'ive  a  main 
characteristic  of  the  classic  and  antique,  the  Eeflective 
of  the  romantic  and  modern,  though  the  notions  by  no 
means  exactly  coincide.  Thus  Shakespeare  is  na'ive. 
He  even  ventures  to  form  an  estimate  in  this  respect  of 
the  most  eminent  poets  of  modern  Germany.  What  is 
attainable  outside  the  limits  of  hving  form,  outside  the 
domain  of  individuahty,  on  the  field  of  ideality,  has 
been  achieved  by  Klopstock.  In  Goethe,  nature  works 
more  faithfully,  more  unmixed,  than  in  any  other  poet ; 
of  moderns  perhaps  he  is  the  least  removed  from  the 
sensuous  reality  of  things.  Even  his  "  Elegies,"  as 
works  of  art,  are  pronounced  naive,  uniting  intellect 
and  heart ;  whilst  in  the  voluptuous  descriptions  of 
the  "  immortal  author  "  of  "  Agathon,"  "  Oberon,"  etc., 
the  Naive  is  felt  to  be  absent.  Goethe  on  November 
29th,  in  sending  back  the  essay,  said  laughingly  that 
of  course  he  must  approve  the  principles  of  a  theory 


378  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

that  treated  him  so  kindly ;  he  thought  that  the  corol- 
laries were  quite  correct.  From  too  great  a  partiality 
to  ancient  poetry,  he  had  often  been  unjust  to  the  mod- 
ern ;  now,  after  Scliiller's  doctrine,  he  could  be  friends 
with  himself  again.  On  the  same  day  Schiller  finished 
the  latter  part  of  the  essay,  the  treatment  of  the  Idyll. 
An  appendix,  on  "  Platitude  and  Overstraining,"  the 
two  rocks  ahead  of  the  Na'ive  and  the  Reflective,  he 
was  reserving  for  the  first  article  in  the  New  Year's 
Horen,  where  he  meant  to  "get  up  a  little  hare-hunt 
through  our  literature  and  particularly  give  certain 
good  friends  like  Nicolai  and  company  a  treat."  The 
essay  itself  had  said  in  a  note :  "  Moliere's  Maid  chat- 
ters on,  up  and  down  our  critical  '  Bibliotheks,'  philo- 
sophical and  literary  Annals  and  books  of  travel,  about 
poetry,  art,  and  the  like,  only,  as  is  fair,  rather  more 
absurdly  on  German  soil  than  on  French,  just  the  stuff 
suitable  to  that  servants'  hall  of  German  literature." 
Humboldt  was  right  in  wishing  this  note  left  out.  The 
Idyll,  which  Schiller  defined  as  the  ideal  of  beauty 
applied  to  real  life,  he  now  regarded  as  the  highest, 
and  also  the  hardest  problem  for  the  Reflective  poet, 
who  has  here  to  produce  the  greatest  poetical  effect 
without  having  recourse  to  pathos.  He  seriously  pur- 
posed composing  such  a  one :  the  subject  was  to  be 
the  marriage  of  Hercules  to  Hebe.  He  writes  to  Hum- 
boldt :  "  There  could  not  be  better  stuff  for  the  poet 
than  this ;  a  poet  dare  not  leave  human  nature,  and 
the  stride  from  man  to  God  is  the  very  thing  the  idyU 
would  treat  of.  True,  the  leading  personages  would  be 
gods  already,  but  through  Hercules  I  can  hnk  them  to 
humanity  still  and  bring  a  movement  into  the  picture. 
Were  I  to  accomplish  this  task,  I  might  hope  thereby 
to  have  gained  for  Reflective  poetry  a  triumph  over 
Naive  itself." 

From  this  rather  singular  poetic  speculation,  which 
he  dared  not  reveal  to  Goethe,  he  was  debarred  by 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  379 

having  to  prepare  the  January  number  of  the  Horen, 
and  by  the  bad  weather,  which,  by  bringing  on  bodily 
suffering,  robbed  him  of  all  rest  at  night.  The  Appen- 
dix to  his  essay  grew  bulkier  under  his  liands  than  he 
had  intended,  but  in  the  thick  of  the  contemplated 
"  hare-hunt,"  he  soon  was  longing  to  get  back  to 
poetry.  On  December  17th  he  writes  to  Goethe:  "  It 
is  long  since  I  felt  so  prosaic  as  I  have  the  last  few 
days,  and  it  is  high  time  I  shut  up  the  philosophic 
shop  :  the  heart  pines  for  a  tangible  object."  Four 
days  after  he  confided  to  Korner :  "  You  can't  imagine 
what  unceasing  tension  of  mind  I  have  to  endure : 
partly  to  keep  myself  competent  for  the  projects  I 
have  once  for  all  undertaken,  partly  to  satisfy  the 
monthly  needs  of  the  Horen,  in  which  my  fellows 
have  left  me  shamefully  in  the  lurch.  It  is  an  unex- 
pected gift  of  Heaven  that  physically  I  am  equal  to 
the  strain,  and,  on  the  whole,  despite  the  continuance 
and  frequent  aggravation  of  my  old  complaints,  I  have 
lost  none  of  my  cheerfulness  of  spirit,  or  strength  of 
resolution,  though  all  the  outward  incentives  fail  that 
might  keep  me  in  heart." 

In  the  middle  of  September  Goethe  had  started  the 
notion  that  by  the  end  of  the  year  they  should  spread 
hope  and  fear  amid  the  ranks  of  authors  and  reviewers ; 
and  when  several  more  attacks  followed  on  the  Horen, 
he  opened  the  question  whether  they  should  not  pass 
judgment  on  them  all  together,  for,  said  he,  this  kind 
of  stuff  burns  better  when  tied  up  in  fagots.  Then, 
a  little  before  the  year  ended,  he  imparted  to  Schiller 
the  happy  thought  of  making  epigrams  on  all  the  jour- 
nals, each  to  consist  of  a  couplet  in  the  manner  of 
Martial's  "  Xenia  "  (benefits) ;  and  a  selection  of  the  best 
should  be  inserted  in  the  "  Almanach."  It  was  not 
until  three  days  after,  when  he  sent  a  dozen  couplets 
by  way  of  specimen,  that  Scliiller  took  up  the  idea 
heartily ;  and  then  in  his  ardour  he  at  once  extended 


380  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

the  plan,  so  that  they  should  come  down  upon  single 
works  as  well,  nay,  if  they  did  not  spare  their  own 
feelings,  they  could  attack  things  sacred  and  profane. 
This  made  him  the  more  glad  at  the  prospect  of  a  visit 
from  Goethe.  "  Now  we'll  have  a  thoroughly  good 
talk  over  everything,"  says  he,  writing  in  the  best  of 
moods,  "  and  once  more  the  word  will  be.  Never  a  day 
without  its  epic/ram."  For  the  moment  the  completion 
of  his  article  for  the  Horen  was  pressing  him ;  and 
here  he  gave  full  play  to  his  indignant  humour.  "  The 
ineffable  platitudes  which  the  Germans  get  sung  to 
them  under  the  name  of  naive  and  facetious  ditties, 
and  over  which  they  will  make  no  end  of  mirth  at  a 
well-spread  table  ; "  the  "  mournful  choir  of  the  Muses 
on  the  Pleisse,  to  which  the  Camoense  on  the  Seine  and 
the  Elbe  make  answer  in  no  better  chords  ; "  the  fury 
of  those  "  good  folks  who  fancy  that,  in  kicking  against 
the  pricks  of  his  severe  verdict  on  Burger's  poems,  and 
who  was  a  poetic  genius,  they  are  fighting  their  own 
battle ; "  his  rebuke  of  the  "  spiritless,  ignoble  utter- 
ance" of  passion  on  our  tragic  stage,  where  Kotzebue, 
after  a  silence  of  three  years,  was  showing  himself  very 
busy  again ;  and  lastly,  the  "  paltriness  of  our  humour- 
ous novels,"  with  a  sneering  hit  at  Nicolai's  "  Stout 
Man's  Story,"  all  this  must  bitterly  provoke  his  adver- 
saries. But  what  cared  Schiller  for  that,  on  his  ideal 
height  ? 

From  January  3d  to  14th,  1796,  he  enjoyed  once 
the  presence  of  his  equal  ally.  Goethe  came  in  mostly 
of  an  evening,  when  he  showed  himself  most  kind  and 
cheerful.  There  was  some  drawing  done  with  Lotte, 
and  many  moments  given  up  to  the  little  Karl. 
"  Goethe  is  quite  taken  with  him,"  writes  Schiller, 
"  and  to  me,  existing  only  in  the  narrowest  life-circle, 
the  child  is  gi-own  such  a  necessity,  that  many  a  time 
I  tremble  at  having  permitted  Fortune  to  get  such  a 
purchase  over  me."     Goethe  promised  many  things  for 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  381 

the  Rorcn,  as  Schiller  wanted  for  the  present  to  be 
left  wholly  to  the  workings  of  his  fancy.  New  "  Xenien  " 
would  of  themselves  take  shape  as  they  talked,  often  a 
joint  product,  one  contributing  the  thought,  another 
the  language. 

Scliiller  purposely  did  no  other  work,  that  he  might 
have  the  needful  relaxation  after  all  his  exertion.  He 
only  attended  to  the  sending  out  of  copies  of  the  Horen 
and  the  "  Almanach,"  which  after  vexatious  delay  had 
come  at  last.  They  wished  to  bring  up  the  numbers 
of  the  "  Xenien  "  to  six  hundred,  if  not  a  round  one  thou- 
sand. Schiller  was  thinking  of  attractive  settings  to 
connect  whole  batches  of  them  into  little  wholes,  and 
he  set  himself  to  make  parodies  of  passages  in  Homer, 
such  as  the  slaughter  of  the  suitors  and  the  visit  to 
Hades,  and  even  a  comedy  in  epigrams. 

Meanwhile  he  got  the  first  instalment  of  his  Copen- 
hagen pension  for  the  third  year  in  the  shape  of  667 
thalers.  Then  a  eulogistic  review  of  Nos.  2  to  10  of 
the  Horen,  in  which  W.  Schlegel  had  undertaken  the 
poetical  part,  appeared  at  last  in  the  Literatur  Zeitung  ; 
but  countermands  of  the  journal  now  kept  coming  in 
so  thick,  that  Cotta  feared  the  loss  would  amount  to  a 
good  third :  there  remained  a  bare  one  thousand,  with 
which  they  could  just  hold  out. 

About  February  10th  Schiller  had  such  an  attack  of 
spasms  that  he  felt  quite  unable  to  continue  working. 
For  the  Horen  he  could  only  throw  off  or  rewrite  a 
short  essay  "  On  the  Moral  Advantage  of  Esthetic 
Manners."  On  the  16th  Goethe  managed  to  tear  him- 
self away  from  the  distractions  of  Weimar.  The  lone- 
lier he  felt  in  that  capital,  where  he  had  fallen  out 
with  the  court  on  the  score  of  its  sheltering  French 
emigres,  and  where  Herder  had  retired  in  a  tiff,  the 
closer  did  he  cling  to  his  suffering  friend.  He  wrote 
to  Meyer :  "  I  only  wish  we  may  stay  long  on  this 
earthly  ball  together;  and  I   hope  Schiller,  too,  not- 


382  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

withstanding  his  apparent  sickliness,  will  hold  out  with 
us."  They  usually  spent  the  evenings  together.  There 
was  much  deliberating  on  "  Wilhelm  Meister,"  much 
zealous  epigram  writing.  They  talked,  too,  of  all  the 
false  tendencies  that  had  arisen,  especially  among 
German  artists  at  Rome,  and  of  the  means  of  counter- 
acting them.  As  Goethe  promised  large  contributions 
to  the  Horen  and  other  fellow  labourers  were  by  no 
means  slack,  Schiller  thought  to  give  up  all  his  time 
to  the  romantic  poem  in  stanzas  which  he  designed  for 
the  "  Almanach ; "  but  he  believed  it  would  be  some 
weeks  before  he  could  proceed  to  the  plot,  which 
required  deep  thought  ;  not  before  August  did  he  hope 
to  finish  it,  for  he  had  done  nothing  in  this  kind  before, 
and  he  laid  specially  stern  demands  upon  himself. 
As  things  turned  out,  prolonged  ill  health  and  count- 
less distraction  kept  him  from  ever  making  a  beginning. 
On  March  8th  he  still  feared  that  nothing  would  be 
settled  before  Korner's  visit,  who  at  the  end  of  April 
was  to  come  with  his  family  to  Jena,  staying  there 
with  Schiller  for  a  couple  of  weeks. 

Melancholy  news  now  reached  him  from  his  home. 
His  father  had  never  kept  the  promise  to  ride  down  to 
Thuriugia  the  year  before,  although  Fritz  had  procured 
him  a  good  price  for  his  book.  None  of  the  fears  en- 
tertained about  his  position  had  come  true,  any  more 
than  the  dreams  that  he  was  to  be  commandant  of 
Tubingen ;  on  the  contrary,  the  Treasury  had,  in  recog- 
nition of  his  services,  assigned  him  four  acres  of  land, 
to  be  laid  out  in  new  nursery  grounds.  To  this  task 
the  old  man,  ambitious  as  he  was  assiduous,  gave  himself 
up  with  such  ardour,  that  he  worked  from  four  in  the 
morning  until  late  at  night,  neglecting  his  family  almost 
entirely.  But  in  the  beginning  of  February  he  fell  ill, 
and  violent  pains  forced  him  to  keep  his  bed.  When 
Schiller  heard  the  sad  tidings  he  wrote  at  once,  express- 
ing his  deep  sympathy  ;  he  also  sent  a  cheque  to  defray 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  383 

expenses.  There  came  an  answer  to  this  on  March 
7th  in  his  father's  own  hand,  but  evidently  written 
under  great  suffering.  On  the  14th  he  was  shocked 
by  the  news  of  the  dangerous  illness  of  his  youngest 
and  favourite  sister,  Nanette,  she  whom  he  intended  to 
have  with  him  at  Jena,  to  improve  her  education. 

By  this  time  he  had  given  up  the  romantic  poem  and 
with  it  even  the  "  Almanach  "  for  that  year ;  instead  of 
which  the  "  Xenien "  were  to  come  out  in  the  type 
of  the  edition  de  luxe  of  Wieland's  works,  embellished 
by  several  engravings  after  Eoman  paintings.  But  the 
execution  of  this  plan,  though  taken  up  resolutely  by 
Cotta,  was  hiudered  by  outward  obstacles. 

When  Goethe  was  leaving  on  the  16th,  Schiller 
promised  to  visit  him  at  Weimar  on  the  occasion  of 
Iffland's  "  star  "  performances,  which  were  to  begin  on 
Good  Friday,  the  25th,  and  last  a  few  weeks.  Though 
there  seemed  little  hope  of  his  being  able  to  attend  the 
theatre,  the  presence  of  Schiller  would  heighten  the 
attractiveness  of  the  parties  that  Goethe  was  going  to 
give  at  his  own  house  during  Iffland's  stay.  Some 
fine  days  which  followed  tempted  Schiller  out  into  the 
open  air;  by  the  21st  he  had  already  enjoyed  two 
drives. 

The  spring  had  also  ripened  a  great  purpose  in  his 
soul;  he  had  decided  for  dramatic  poetry,  and  that, 
not  commencing  with  the  easier  task  of  "  The  Knights," 
but  with  the  colossal  one  of  "  Wallenstein,"  his  first 
drama  should  be  an  altogether  new  and  dazzling  phe- 
nomenon. His  old  notes  soon  made  him  at  home  again 
in  the  materials.  He  writes  to  Kbrner :  "  I  advance  to 
this  new  mode  of  life  with  much  pleasure  and  tolerable 
courage.  Of  my  former  manner  and  art  there  is  little 
that  can  avail  me  here,  but  I  trust  T  am  far  enough  on 
with  the  new  to  make  the  venture.  This  much  I  know, 
that  I  am  in  a  fair  way,  and  if  I  do  not  achieve  any- 
thing hke  what  I  demand  of  myself,  I  shall  neverthe- 


384  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

less  do  more  than  I  have  ever  yet  done  in  this  hne." 
If   hitherto    he    had    laid    the    stress    mainly   on  the 
Plurality  of  the  detail,  he  would  now  weigh  everything 
by  its  effect  on  the  Unity  of  the  whole.     His  ideas 
about  realism  and  idealism  would  guide  him  here.     "  It 
is  astonishing  how  much  of  the  realistic  mere  advanc- 
ing years  bring  with  them,  and  how  much  persistent 
converse  with  Goethe  and  study  of  the  ancients  have  by 
degi-ees  developed  in   me."     True,  he   would  thereby 
get  into    Goethe's  province,  and   lose   by   comparison 
with  him ;  yet  something  would  be  left  that  was  his 
own,  something  that  Goethe  never  could  attain.     And 
so  he  flatters  himself  in  sanguine  moments  that  pos- 
terity will  not  subordinate  their  styles  the  one  to  the 
other,  but  class  them  under  a  higher,  ideal  generic-term. 
In  sore  anxiety  about  Nanette,  Schiller  on  the  23d 
went  with  his  famOy  to  Weimar,  where  Lotte  and  Karl 
were  to  stay  at  Frau  von  Stein's  house.     On  this  oc- 
casion Goethe's  August,  seven  years  old,  found  his  way 
into  the  house  of  his  father's  indignant  friend,  and  soon 
got  intimate  with  little   Karl,  nearly   four  years  his 
junior.     Schiller  felt  so  well  at  Weimar  that  he  was 
able  to  go  to  the  play ;  Goethe  arranged   so  that  he 
could  drive  there  and  back,  and  fitted  up  a  box  for 
him,  as  the  theatre  had  none.     People  miglit  laugh  at 
Schiller,  caged  up  in  it  like  some   pet  bird,  but  no 
greater  honour  could  be  done  to  the  poet  whose  youth- 
ful dramas  had  taken  the   German   stage   by  storm; 
Goethe  was  ahvays  hoping  from  him,  should  his  life 
be  spared,  the  highest  success  in  the  scenic  art.    Schiller 
was  glad,  after  so  many  years,  to  meet  Ifliand  again, 
and  to  witness  his  finished  acting,  though  it  wanted  the 
charm  of  his  youth.     To  the  plot  of  his  new  drama 
these  performances  were  of  great  value.     At  Goethe's 
long-expressed  desire  he  was  altering  his  "Egmont" 
for  the  stage,  which  indeed  was  done  a  httle  ruthlessly, 
passages  being  added,  left  out,  or  transposed.     These 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  385 

pleasant  days  were  darkened  by  the  terrible  news  that 
poor  Nanette  was  no  more.  Happily  there  were  many 
distractions  that  did  much  to  turn  his  thoughts  from 
this  grievous  loss.  He  went  home  on  the  20th,  to  return 
again  on  the  evening  of  the  26th  to  the  performance 
of  "  Egmont."  But  before  that,  he  received  such  afflict- 
ing news  from  Solitude,  where  not  only  had  the  father's 
condition  grown  worse,  but  sister  Louise,  too,  had  sick- 
ened, that  he  wrote  entreating  Christophine  to  go  there 
at  his  expense.  The  evening  after  an  effective  repre- 
sentation of  "  Egmont "  was  spent  with  the  friend  to 
whom  he  ever  felt  more  closely  drawn,  and  who  prom- 
ised to  see  him  again  soon  at  Jena.  Next  morning  he 
hastened  home,  as  he  expected  Korner  to  arrive  that 
afternoon.  Schiller  was  now  altogether  in  that  path 
of  fiction  which  he  was  never  again  to  quit ;  his  pro- 
longed researches  in  history,  philosophy,  testhetics,  were 
but  preliminaries  to  an  artistic  perfecting  of  his  poetic 
power,  which  in  drama  touched  its  highest  point. 


CHAPTER  II. 

FROM  APRIL,  1796,  TO  APRIL,  1799. 

Although  from  this  time  Schiller's  work  in  the 
Horen  was  coulined  to  the  duties  of  an  editor,  and 
these  were  more  a  recreation  to  him  than  real  exertion, 
nevertheless  the  completion  of  a  great  drama  of  a 
period  so  painful  to  Germany,  yet  so  fertile  of  heroic 
characters,  taxed  his  powers  for  nearly  a  good  three 
years  more.  For  two  years  he  employed  the  bright 
spring  and  summer  time  on  the  "  Almanach,"  while 
the  late  autumn  and  winter  were  chiefly  taken  up 
with  inventing  the  plot,  which  became  materially 
altered  in  accordance  with  the  results  he  had  gathered 
from  continual  study  and  from  the  interchange  of 
thoughts,  especially  with  Goethe,  on  the  difference 
between  epic  and  dramatic  form. 

Kcirner  spent  three  whole  weeks  in  the  most  inti- 
mate converse  with  Schiller,  and  their  families  felt 
closely,  inseparably  linked  to  each  other.  Count 
Gessler,  too,  a  common  friend  of  both,  was  a  most 
pleasant  companion.  Cotta  and  his  wife,  on  their  way 
home  from  Leipzig  Fair,  paid  them  a  visit.  He  was  to 
publish  the  "  Almanach,"  but,  to  avoid  delay,  it  should 
be  printed  at  Jena  and  sent  out  from  that  place. 
Meanwhile  among  the  "  Xenien,"  most  of  them  sarcas- 
tic enough,  some  tender  and  serious  ones  had  been 
produced,  and  these,  if  put  in  the  "  Almanach,"  would 
make  its  value  a  lasting  one.  Korner  was  charmed 
with  this  motley  throng  of  epigrams,  admiring  their 

386 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  387 

dignity  and  their  apt  humour.  Goethe  came,  accord- 
ing to  promise,  directly  he  could  escape  from  work,  to 
finish  the  last  book  of  his  romance  in  his  favourite 
room  at  the  old  castle.  And  then  the  four  friends  had 
many  a  spirited  discussion  upon  hfe,  or  hterature,  or 
art.  In  these  the  ladies  joined  also,  and  Dora  Stock, 
so  clever  with  her  brush,  amused  every  one  by  her 
skill  at  repartee.  Another  great  source  of  interest  were 
the  children ;  one  of  them,  hereafter  the  soldier-poet, 
Theodor  Korner,  was  then  just  five  years  old.  Kcirner 
now  grew  far  more  intimate  with  Goethe,  who  showed 
all  the  sweetness  and  kindliness  of  his  nature.  When 
Dora  Stock  once  asked  him  why  he  urged  Gessler  to 
marry  and  did  not  follow  so  wise  a  precept  himself, 
Goethe  answered,  gravely,  "  I  am  married,  only  without 
a  ceremony."  He  would  gladly  have  brought  Schiller 
and  his  friends  to  form  an  unprejudiced  judgment  of 
his  connection  with  Christiane  Vulpius,  but  Schiller 
took  Lotte's  view  of  the  wdiole  affair.  His  antipathy 
for  Christiane  was  carried  so  far,  that  in  his  letters 
to  Goethe,  when  he  could  not  help  alluding  to  her,  he 
simply  put  a  dash,  or  spoke  of  Goethe's  "  house."  A 
kind  invitation  to  let  his  Karl  come  to  him,  he  pohtely 
declined.  Schlegel  was  now  at  Jena,  and  often  took 
part  in  the  conversations.  The  two  poets  looked  upon 
a  man  of  such  knowledge  and  taste,  their  valued  fellow 
worker  in  the  Horen,  as  an  ally,  though  Goethe  was 
in  doubt  about  his  democratic  leanings.  The  latter 
was  already  turning  out  some  exquisite  pieces  for  the 
"  Almanach,"  while  Schiller  could  not  rightly  get  into 
the  poetic  mood.  His  fears  for  Lotte's  health  were 
lessened  on  knowing  that  he  was  to  taste  for  a  second 
time  the  joys  of  fatherhood.  But  then  there  came 
sad  and  grievous  news  from  home.  His  mother  felt 
utterly  miserable ;  his  father's  condition  would  not 
improve  ;  and  Louise's  illness  made  them  dread  the 
worst.      It  deeply  pained  him  that  he   could  do  no 


388  THE   LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

more  tlian  help  with  money  and  induce  Eeinwald  not 
to  call  Christophine  away ;  all  the  while  he  had  to 
hide  this  sorrow  from  his  friend,  lest  it  should  mar  the 
pleasure  of  their  social  intercourse. 

After  Kcirner's  departure,  Goethe  stayed  nearly  three 
weeks  longer,  during  which  he  composed  several  things 
for  the  "  Almanach."  Schiller  felt  much  better,  and 
on  fine  days  he  could  go  out  walking.  He  had  had  a 
standing-desk  made  for  him  so  as  to  spare  his  chest. 
Fortunately  he  soon  received  more  comforting  accounts 
of  his  kinsfolk,  but  Lotte's  approaching  confinement 
filled  him  with  anxious  fear.  The  "  Almanach  "  ought 
to  be  in  the  printer's  hands  soon  ;  and  he  bestirred 
himself  to  finish  it.  After  writing  a  good  many  more 
serious  "  Xenien,"  he  began  that  glorious  "  Plaint  of 
Ceres,"  which,  suggested  by  Goethe's  observations  on 
the  influence  of  light  upon  the  forms  and  colours 
of  plants,  received  a  poetic  transfiguration  from  his 
own  tender,  melancholy  mood.  The  "  Almanach  "  and 
a  searching  critical  estimate  of  the  eighth  book  of 
"  Wilhelm  Meister"  occupied  the  whole  of  his  time ; 
the  story  had  taken  such  a  hold  of  him,  that  he  wrote 
to  Korner,  he  was  but  a  poetic  dwarf  to  Goethe.  He 
was  specially  charmed  by  Mignon's  song,  "  So  lasst 
mich  scheinen,  bis  ich  werde."  He  wished  to  make 
his  review  of  the  work  his  real  business  for  a  time,  as 
the  "  Almanach  "  was  quite  sufficiently  provided  for. 
The  arranging  of  the  "  Xenien,"  however,  entailed 
much  labour. 

Wlien  Lotte  had  on  July  11th  been  safely  dehvered 
of  a  son,  courage  and  hope  came  back  to  Schiller's 
heart.  The  godfathers  chosen  were  Count  Schimmel- 
mann  (after  whom  the  child  was  named  Ernst),  Voigt, 
and  Paulus ;  the  godmothers,  the  Countess,  Frau  von 
Kalb,  landlady  Griesbach,  Korner's  wife,  and  Schiller's 
mother.  The  second  name  —  Friedrich  —  was  taken 
from  Schiller  himself,  that  of  Wilhelm,  no  doubt,  from 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  389 

the  hero  of  Goethe's  romance.  Schiller  had  hardly 
liked  to  invite  his  author-friend  to  the  christening,  but 
hinted  that  Frau  von  Kalb  was  surprised  not  to  see 
him  there;  He  would  have  walked  in  without  waiting 
to  be  asked,  rejoined  Goethe,  but  these  ceremonies 
were  really  too  much  for  him.  He  came  soon  after 
and  stayed  some  days,  when  they  talked  of  the 
"  Almanach  "  in  which  the  "  Xenien  "  were  to  appear, 
and  of  Schiller's  comments  upon  "  Wilhelm  Meister." 
Political  affairs,  which  he  had  always  gladly  avoided, 
now  began  to  disquiet  him  in  earnest,  now  that  his 
native  land  was  overrun  by  the  French,  and  even 
Thuringia  seemed  threatened.  Communication  with 
Suabia  was  wholly  interrupted. 

At  this  time  W.  Schlegel  brought  his  newly  wedded 
wife  to  Jena ;  they  immediately  called  on  Schiller. 
Caroline  Schlegel,  then  in  her  thirtieth  year,  had 
already  been  much  talked  about.  She  was  the  daugh- 
ter of  the  Oriental  scholar  J.  D.  Michaelis  of  Gottingen. 
On  the  early  death  of  her  first  husband,  Bohmer,  at 
Nausthal,  she  had  gone  to  Mainz,  where  Therese 
Heyne,  a  friend  of  her  girlish  days,  was  now  the 
wife  of  Georg  Forster.  She  shared  his  republican 
views  and  zealously  worked  for  them ;  but  having  left 
the  city  when  it  was  besieged  by  the  Alhes,  she  was 
taken  prisoner  and  not  set  at  liberty  for  three  months. 
Schlegel,  who  had  known  her  from  the  Gottingen 
days,  and  had  always  remained  her  friend,  accom- 
panied her  to  Leipzig,  leaving  her  near  there,  under 
the  care  of  his  younger  brother  Friedrich.  Soon  after 
this  she  joined  her  mother,  who  had  removed  to  Bruns- 
wick. Here  came  Schlegel,  too,  not  without  views 
upon  Ebert's  vacant  chair  at  the  Carolinum,  though  he 
was  still  more  attracted  by  the  Jena  professorship,  of 
which  Schiller  gave  hints.  The  marriage  took  place 
on  July  6th,  and  three  days  after,  Schlegel  brought 
Caroline    to    his    home    at    Jena.       This    agreeable, 


390  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

quick-witted,  but  self-willed  and  artful  woman  thought 
Schiller  handsomer  than  she  had  imagined  him ;  she 
appeared  exceedingly  friendly,  but  he  did  not  alto- 
gether trust  her.  Only  twelve  days  later  he  wrote 
that  one  could  associate  pleasantly  with  Schlegel's 
wife,  who  had  gi-eat  powers  of  conversation,  but  the 
question  was  whether  a  longer  acquaintance,  especially 
if  it  ripened  into  intimacy,  would  not  reveal  some 
thorn. 

Directly  after  there  came  Schiller's  sister-in-law  with 
her  new  husband,  his  old  friend  Legationsrath  von 
Wolzogen,  who  had  thrown  up  his  situation  in  Wlir- 
temberg  and  was  looking  out  for  another  in  Thuringia. 
At  the  same  time  Friedrich  Schlegel,  now  in  his  twenty- 
fifth  year,  and  "  crisp,  and  curled  inside  and  out,"  as  his 
sister-in-law  expressed  it,  felt  drawn  to  Jena,  where  he 
hoped  to  be  on  pleasant  terms  with  Schiller.  Caroline 
had  exerted  such  a  sobering  influence  on  him,  that  he 
felt  himself  a  changed  man.  He  then  resolved  to 
abandon  the  study  of  law,  to  which  his  parents  had 
constrained  him,  and  devote  himself  to  antiquities  and 
art.  With  that  view  he  went  and  settled  at  Dresden, 
where  Schiller  found  him  at  Korner's  house.  He 
attached  himself  to  the  latter,  as  the  intimate  friend 
of  his  revered  Schiller.  Korner  offered  the  poet  some 
articles  by  Friedrich  for  the  TJialia,  but  they  were 
condemned  as  too  crude.  Yet  in  a  letter  of  June  12th, 
Schiller  asked  if  young  Schlegel  had  anything  available 
for  the  Horen.  Korner  spoke  warmly  in  his  praise,  but 
Schiller,  after  reading  an  article  of  his  in  the  Mercur  on 
the  limits  of  the  Beautiful,  was  afraid  he  had  no  gift  as 
a  writer,  for  he  lacked  clearness  and  ease  of  expression. 
Schlegel  now  wrote  in  his  own  behoof,  but  Schiller  felt 
a  good  deal  hurt  at  a  cutting  notice  of  his  "  Almanach," 
which  appeared  under  Schlegel's  name  in  Deutschland, 
Reichardt's  paper.  Shortly  before  he  came  to  Jena  he 
sent  Schnier  an  essay  on  Alexander  and  Ciesar,  which 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  391 

to  himself  seemed  highly  valuable,  and  whose  accept- 
ance he  confidently  reckoned  on.  But  though  Schiller 
was  pleased  with  him  personally  and  thought  he  prom- 
ised much  for  the  future,  and  though  Kcirner  and 
Wilhelm  interceded,  he  went  so  far  as  to  disobHge  the 
sharp  critic,  whose  connection  with  Eeichardt  nettled 
him,  by  rejecting  the  slashing  onslaught  upon  Caesar, 
which  had  more  merit  than  many  things  in  the  Horen. 
Then  again  in  the  "  Xenien,"  he  came  down  bitterly  on 
Schlegel's  self-appreciation,  and  on  his  Graecomania, 
which,  as  Schiller  thought,  kept  him  from  rightly 
understanding  or  valuing  the  Greeks.  By  the  coming 
and  settling  of  Caroline  von  Beulwitz  and  her  husband, 
Schiller  gained  a  welcome  addition  to  his  family  circle. 
They  were  both  highly  cultivated,  Carohne  even  poet- 
ically gifted,  but  her  precarious  position  hindered  her 
from  ever  getting  to  feel  quite  at  her  ease.  Frau 
Schlegel  found  the  talented  Caroline  tedious,  while  the 
latter  looked  upon  her  as  a  snake. 

At  length  communication  with  Suabia,  about  which 
country  the  most  disquieting  rumours  had  prevailed, 
was  once  more  declared  open.  Then  Schiller  heard 
how  Solitude  had  been  surprised  by  a  band  of  soldiers, 
who  carried  off  everything  they  could  find,  seizing  the 
snuff-box  and  silver  buckles  of  his  sick  father.  What 
grieved  him  more  deeply  was  to  know  that  his  parent 
lay  in  agonising  pain,  longing  for  death.  At  this  time 
Schiller  wrote  "  The  Votive  Tablets,"  those  glorious 
apophthegms  in  which,  to  use  Goethe's  phrase,  the 
great  relations  of  human  nature  are  set  forth  with  such 
nobihty,  freedom,  and  boldness.  Luckily,  the  outbreak 
of  war  in  Italy  had  delayed  Goethe's  departure  for  that 
land  of  the  fine  arts  ;  and  on  the  18th  he  came  to  spend 
a  few  weeks  at  Jena.  During  this  visit  they  finished 
printing  those  satirical  epigrams  chosen  as  "  Xenien  "  for 
the  close  of  the  "  Almanach."  Cleverly  as  Schiller  had 
succeeded  in  arranging  them  as  a  whole,  he  may  have 


392  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

felt  a  tiuge  of  reluctance  at  flinging  abroad  these  pun- 
gent couplets  which  would  set  half  the  world  in  arms 
against  his  "  Almauach."  But  he  and  his  noble  comrade, 
Germany's  greatest  poet,  were  fighting  a  good  fight,  to 
the  annihilation  of  well-meaning,  mutually  deferential 
mediocrity,  and  to  the  setting  up  of  high  thoroughness 
in  life,  in  science,  in  art.  The  evenings  which  Goethe 
spent  at  Schiller's  with  Wolzogen  and  his  wife  were 
full  of  interest  and  delight.  There  was  much  talk  with 
Wolzogen  about  architecture,  much  sketching  of  moon- 
light landscapes ;  but  what  lent  those  evenings  their 
gi'eatest  charm  was  Goethe's  readings  from  his  newly 
begun  poem,  "  Hermann  und  Dorothea." 

The  printing  of  the  "  Almanach  "  was  just  completed, 
when  on  the  19tli  (the  house  then  full  of  gnests)  there 
came  the  tidings  of  his  father's  death,  which  had  taken 
place  twelve  days  before.  What  trouble  and  anxiety 
Fritz  had  given  the  good  old  man,  who  with  such 
energy  and  uprightness  had  walked  through  a  hfe 
beset  with  thorns !  What  a  crushing  blow,  this,  to  his 
dear  mother,  whose  days  had  been  one  chain  of  endless 
trouble  and  care  !  How  terrible  for  Schiller  the  thought 
that  he  never  could  do  aught  again  for  him  who  was 
gone,  never  again  cause  him  pleasure,  not  even  by  the 
most  finely  wrought  masterpiece,  nor  by  the  most  bril- 
liant poetic  fame !  He  at  once  sent  his  mother  a  letter 
full  of  tender  sympathy.  "  You,  dearest  mother,"  he 
wrote,  "  must  now  choose  your  lot  entirely  for  yourself, 
and  let  no  anxiety  influence  you  in  the  choice.  Ask 
yourself  where  you  would  like  best  to  hve,  —  here,  at 
my  house,  or  at  Christophine's,  or  at  home  with  Louise. 
Whichever  way  your  choice  may  fall,  we  will  provide 
the  means.  .  .  .  Best  of  mothers,  anything  you  need 
for  an  easy  life  shall  be  yours ;  henceforth  it  is  my 
care  that  no  care  oppress  you  more.  After  so  many 
grievous  trials,  the  evening  of  your  life  ought  to  be 
made  bright,  or,  at  any  rate,  peaceful,  and  I  hope  that 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  »  393 

you  are  yet  to  enjoy  many  a  happy  day  in  the  bosom 
of  your  children  and  grandchildren.  ...  I  wish  my 
good  Louise  much  joy  of  her  happy  outlook  with  the 
brave  young  man  [Vicarius  Frankh]  who  offers  her  his 
hand,  and  whose  generous  behaviour  by  the  sick-bed  of 
our  father  shows  his  good  feeling.  A  thousand  times 
let  her  commend  me  to  him  as  my  future  brother-in- 
law,  and  assure  him  beforehand  of  my  friendship  and 
my  heart's  devotion."  He  begged  his  brother-in-law 
Keinwald,  who  had  long  been  looking  impatiently  for 
his  sick  wife's  return,  to  let  her  remain  yet  a  httle 
while  at  her  mother's  side.  Goethe  showed  himself 
most  kind  to  Schiller  in  this  time  of  bereavement,  and 
remained  at  Jena  beyond  the  time  he  had  fixed.  Writ- 
ing to  Voigt  on  the  30th,  to  excuse  his  absence  to  the 
duke,  he  says :  "  I  dare  say  I  shall  be  here  some  time 
longer ;  I  have  not  the  heart  to  leave  poor  Schiller  in  the 
state  he  is  in.  His  father  died  lately,  and  his  youngest 
boy  seems  as  if  he  would  soon  be  taken  from  them.  He 
bears  all  with  unshaken  spirit,  but  his  bodily  ailments 
break  out  the  more  fiercely,  and  I  fear  much  that  this 
crisis  will  excessively  weaken  him,  all  the  more  because 
now,  as  ever,  he  cannot  be  induced  to  go  out ;  so  that 
he  never  sees  society,  and,  in  return,  few  people  visit 
liim.  I  tell  you  this  in  confidence,  as  I  don't  exactly 
care  to  speak  openly  of  this  state  of  things." 

By  October  4th  he  thought  he  might  leave  him. 
The  distribution  of  the  "  Almanach,"  which  Schiller 
had  taken  upon  himself,  gave  him  a  great  deal  of 
trouble :  the  first  dehvery  was  packed  in  his  own 
house.  Not  before  the  middle  of  the  month  was  he 
altogether  rid  of  the  tiresome  job.  At  Jena  Frau 
Schlegel  had  managed  to  get  sight  of  the  proof-sheets. 
Though  she  was  treated  as  a  guest  by  Schiller  she  still 
bore  him  a  secret  grudge ;  so  did  her  brother-in-law, 
who  in  Eeichardt's  Deutschland  kept  making  spiteful 
allusion  to  the  Horen,  which  had  rejected  his  article 


394  •  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

To  be  sure,  he  was  liberally  rewarded  for  this  in  the 
"  Xeuien."  The  satire  levelled  at  him  did  not  escape 
Frau  Schlegel's  notice ;  and  it  increased  her  dislike  of 
these  couplets  that  were  now  putting  all  the  hterary 
world  in  a  ferment.  And  so  she  vented  her  wrath 
upon  Schiller,  trying,  like  Friedrich,  to  patronise  him, 
by  admitting  that  perhaps  he  had  some  sort  of  talent, 
but  no  genius.  Five-sixths  of  the  "  Xenien  "  were  by 
him,  she  said,  for  Goethe  had  only  written  the  good- 
humoured,  inoffensive  ones,  and  thus  Schiller  should 
alone  smart  for  it ;  one  could  touch  him  at  all  points, 
and  he  was  very  sensitive. 

With  great  gusto  Schiller  on  the  2 2d  began  working 
at  his  "  Wallenstein "  again,  which  he  had  promised 
Cotta  for  the  following  summer.  Yet  he  was  hindered 
from  making  advance  with  it.  Parting  with  Goethe 
was  more  painful  than  ever.  On  November  1st,  Hum- 
boldt at  last  came  back  with  his  family  to  stop  at 
Jena  till  the  spring ;  and  it  was  delightful  for  Schiller 
to  have  this  friend  with  him.  The  fears  about  his 
infant  son  had  passed,  and  he  was  reassured  as  to  his 
mother's  position.  She  had  pretty  apartments  in  the 
Castle  of  Leonberg  placed  at  her  service,  and,  pro  tern., 
a  gratuity  of  seventy-five  gulden  from  the  duke :  a 
fixed  pension  lay  in  prospect.  The  good  woman  was 
beside  herself  with  joy  at  the  thirty  gulden  per  quarter 
set  aside  for  her  by  her  son  :  only  under  absolute  neces- 
sity would  she  avail  herself  of  it.  But  if  Schiller  was 
soothed  for  the  moment,  the  strong  excitement  of  the 
preceding  months  had  set  his  nerves  upon  the  stretch. 
He  was  watching  for  attacks  upon  the  "  Xenien." 
True,  he  thought  it  "  worth  a  great  deal  to  win  this 
triumph  over  revilers  and  enviers,"  viz.  that  in  the  be- 
ginning of  December  a  new  edition  of  the  "  Almanach  " 
sliould  be  called  for.  Schiller  had  the  second  one,  of 
five  hundred  copies,  rapidly  printed  at  Jena  on  fine 
paper,  and  Cotta  prepared  a  third  one  at  Tiibingen  in 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  395 

January.  But  the  poet  felt  it  a  point  of  honour  now 
to  keep  up  the  Horen,  too :  if  the  sale  fell  off,  they 
must  lower  the  fees  to  contributors :  for  the  last  num- 
bers of  the  year,  on  which  orders  for  the  new  year 
would  greatly  depend,  it  was  important  to  secure  at- 
tractive matter  ;  and  happily  there  was  no  lack  of  that. 
He  could  not  help  being  pecuharly  affected  by  a  letter 
from  the  Countess  Schimmelmann  who  could  not  en- 
tirely hide  her  dishke  of  the  "  Xenien,"  which  in  Copen- 
hagen had  infuriated  every  one.  And  she  particularly 
regretted  Schiller's  connection  with  Goethe.  It  is  true 
the  authors  had  not  spared  Schiller's  benefactor,  Bagge- 
sen,  and  they  had  hit  the  two  Stolbergs  hard,  but  it  was 
their  principle  to  combat  all  mistaken  tendencies  with- 
out respect  of  persons.  On  the  25th  Schiller  received 
from  Hamburg  the  final  remittance  of  his  Copenhagen 
pension  in  the  shape  of  ten  ducats.  Though  he  felt 
rather  humiliated,  he  hastened  to  reply  in  a  friendly 
tone,  and  especially  to  set  before  the  countess  a  truer 
estimate  of  Goethe ;  Lotte  also  added  words  in  praise 
of  their  noble  friend. 

The  materials  of  his  "  Wallenstein  "  were  still  in 
their  crude  form ;  they  would  not  fit  into  the  narrow 
limits  of  one  drama.  But  Schiller  felt  himself  a  match 
for  them  notwithstanding.  He  already  ventured  to 
fix  with  Cotta  the  number  of  the  sheets,  and  was 
going  to  send  him  a  picture  of  Nemesis  for  the  vignette 
to  symbolise  the  central  point  of  the  drama.  His  fre- 
quent ill  health  could  only  disturb,  not  hinder  him. 
As  soon  as  he  had  obtained  a  sure  view  of  the  action, 
without  waiting  to  complete  the  plot,  he  proceeded 
to  fill  in  the  first  act,  which  on  Humboldt's  advice 
he  wrote  in  prose,  as  being  more  convenient  for  actors 
and  more  pleasing  to  spectators.  This  act,  the  longest 
of  all,  he  hoped  to  finish  in  three  weeks. 

Of  all  the  coarse  and  scurrilous  attacks  made  upon 
the  "Xenien,"    none    were  so   painful  to    Schiller  as 


396  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

those  aimed  at  Goethe's  "  natural "  marriage.  The 
latter  met  these  rude  efforts  to  soil  his  good  name 
with  that  beautiful  elegy  prefixed  to  his  "  Hermann 
und  Dorothea,"  with  which  he  wished  to  begin  the 
New  Year's  number  of  the  Horen.  Schiller  did  not 
want  it  to  be  pubhshed  then,  for  the  piece,  he  thought, 
would  fall  upon  a  time  ill  fitted  for  its  good  reception. 
He  feared,  perhaps,  that  the  express  mention  in  it  of 
Goethe's  "  wife "  and  "  boy "  might  provoke  fresh 
sallies  of  abuse.  Personally,  he  was  most  offended  at 
Eeichardt's  language  in  the  Deutschland,  where  he  ex- 
pressed "  his  hearty  contempt  for  Schiller's  mean  and 
disreputable  conduct,"  a  contempt  the  more  unmixed 
as  his  "  literary  powers  and  efforts  "  by  no  means  stood 
in  the  same  rank  with  that  true  genius  (Goethe),  which, 
though  stained  by  immorality,  had  still  some  title  to 
respect.  If  Schiller  could  not  name  the  author  of  his 
calumnies  or  prove  his  accusations,  he  was  to  be  held 
devoid  of  honour.  Schiller  at  once  wrote  to  Goethe 
(it  was  Christmas  Day)  that  they  must  foil  this  ma- 
noeuvre of  dividing  them  by  showing  a  united  front, 
and  he  enclosed  liis  sketch  of  a  reply.  If  Goethe 
would  do  something  too,  so  much  the  better.  But 
Goethe  was  about  to  start  for  Leipzig  in  two  days 
with  the  duke,  and  he  managed  adroitly  to  shirk  the 
"  swift  decisive  retort  "  demanded  by  Schiller.  He 
considered  the  reply  sent  for  his  inspection  too  serious, 
too  good-natured  :  it  ought  to  be  as  aesthetic  as  possible, 
"  a  rhetorical,  forensic,"  sopliistic  piece  of  raillery,  re- 
calling, by  its  freedom  and  calm  survey  of  the  case,  the 
"  Xenien  "  themselves.  Instead  of  descending  to  an 
arena  convenient  for  the  antagonist,  as  Schiller  was 
doing,  they  should  avail  themselves  of  the  shifts  and 
the  evasions  that  lay  so  ready  to  their  hands,  to 
demand  of  the  editor  that  he  should  give  his  name 
in  his  journals  and  print  copies  of  the  poems  in  dis- 
pute.    Thus  they  would  harass  the  enemy  exceedingly 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  397 

and  find  occasion  to  ridicule  him ;  the  matter  would 
turn  to  merriment  and  time  would  be  gained.  Occa- 
sionally some  fresh  opponent  might  start  up,  whom 
they  could  lash  in  passing ;  the  pubhc  would  grow  in- 
different, and  they  would  get  advantage  in  every  way. 
On  the  journey  he  would  be  sure  to  find  the  time  and 
the  mood  for  such  a  composition  ;  besides,  he  wished 
to  consult  some  friends  about  it.  And  Schiller  felt 
this  might  content  him  for  the  moment. 

The  closing  year  had  a  special  pleasure  in  store  for 
him.  The  appointment  of  his  brother-in-law,  Wol- 
zogen,  as  privy  councillor  at  Weimar  was,  after  long 
suspense,  decided  upon  through  the  intervention  of 
Goethe  and  Voigt.  He  was  also  dehghted  at  the  great 
success  of  his  sister-in-law's  novel,  "  Agnes  von  Lihen." 
Even  Caroline  Schlegel,  who  piqued  herself  on  her 
sagacity,  declared,  like  many  others,  that  it  was  by 
Goethe,  and  even  he  had  never  created  so  pure  and 
perfect  a  female  character  before.  Its  continuation 
was,  to  the  no  small  advantage  of  the  Horen,  looked 
forward  to  with  general  impatience. 

Even  in  the  bad  days  of  January,  Schiller  could  keep 
at  work  upon  the  "  Wallenstein,"  much  as  he  pined  for 
clearer  air  and  freer  movement.  After  giving  up  his 
plan  of  going  to  Weimar  in  the  spring,  he  determined 
to  buy  the  garden  of  the  deceased  Professor  Schmidt, 
pleasantly  and  healthily  placed  on  a  height  overlook- 
ing the  Leutra  between  the  Engelgatterthor  and  the 
Neuthor.  The  small  house  in  it,  with  some  little 
alterations,  would  serve  as  a  residence,  even  in  winter. 
But  the  affair  was  delayed.  Before  he  could  go  on 
with  the  "  Wallenstein,"  at  which  he  had  toiled  unin- 
termittingly,  the  play  had  to  pass  through  another 
severe  crisis  in  its  plot.  He  had  written  to  Gotta  on 
the  1st  that  the  book  must  be  printed  at  Jena,  by 
which  he  would  gain  three  or  four  weeks.  The  whole, 
including  a  dramatic  prelude,  would  fill  fifteen  sheets. 


398  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

He  asked  the  same  payment  as  for  tlie  Horen,  six 
louis  d'or  per  sheet.  Cotta  consented  to  everything 
without  hesitation,  but  the  work  of  composition  would 
not  advance.  On  the  2  2d  came  Goethe,  on  a  visit  to 
Jena.  Alexander  von  Humboldt  was  spending  the 
winter  there  with  his  younger  brother.  Goethe  said 
of  him  that  his  deep  knowledge  of  all  natural  things 
would  of  itself  sutlice  to  fill  with  interest  a  whole 
period  of  one's  life.  Schiller  treated  him  in  the 
friendliest  way,  but  never  got  very  near  to  him ;  he 
thought  there  was  something  vehement  and  bitter 
about  him,  while  the  great  natural  philosopher  recog- 
nised the  poet's  worth. 

As  Goethe  during  his  stay  at  Jena  nearly  finished 
"  Hermann  und  Dorothea,"  and  also  talked  over  with 
his  friend  the  plot  of  a  new  epic  poem,  their  evening 
conversations  often  led  them  to  the  nature  of  this  kind 
of  poetry  and  of  its  opposite,  the  dramatic ;  in  these 
talks  Humboldt,  then  at  work  on  a  translation  of 
^schylus's  "Agamemnon,"  took  a  lively  part.  Schiller 
now  read  Sophocles  and  Shakespeare,  whose  "  Julius 
Ccfisar  "  Wilham  Schlegel  was  translating.  The  deeper 
insight  he  then  gained  into  the  nature  of  dramatic  art 
suggested  many  modifications  in  the  plot  of  his  "  "\Val- 
lenstein,"  though  without  shaking  its  foundation.  The 
next  "  Almanach  "  was  discussed,  and  Goethe  held  out  a 
prospect  of  some  ballads  for  it.  The  "  Hero  and 
Leander,"  begun  the  year  before,  he  had  laid  aside ; 
those  that  now  floated  in  his  mind  were  the  "  Magi- 
cian's Apprentice  "  and  the  "  Bride  of  Corinth."  The 
excitement  about  the  attacks  on  the  "  Xenien,"  over 
which  Wieland  and  Nicolai  had  also  maundered  after 
their  manner,  had  now  subsided ;  even  Eeichardt  was 
not  honoured  with  a  reply.  Several  visits  from  relatives 
divided  the  poet's  attention. 

The  solitude  into  which  Schiller  saw  himself 
plunged  at  the  beginning  of  April  gave  him  oppor- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  399 

timity  to  think  out  his  "  Wallenstein."  Having  at 
this  time  unexpectedly  received  a  diploma  from  the 
Academy  of  Sciences  at  Stockholm,  he  was  glad  to 
find  himself  "  extending  his  roots,  and  his  own  exist- 
ence having  influence  upon  others."  The  remembrance 
of  the  hours  passed  vsdth  Goethe  did  his  heart  good. 
He  writes  to  him :  "  Fare  you  right  well,  my  friend, 
growing  ever  dearer  to  me.  I  am  still  surrounded  by 
the  fair  spirits  you  have  left  behind  you,  and  hope  to 
get  better  and  better  acquainted  with  them."  In  his 
garden,  the  purchase  of  which  was  at  length  concluded, 
he  hoped  soon  to  make  up  for  the  delays  of  the  last 
three  months.  Deep  researches  on  the  difference  be- 
tween epic  and  dramatic  poetry  were  carried  on  by 
letter  with  Goethe,  who  put  together  a  little  treatise 
out  of  them  and  begged  Schiller  still  further  to  work 
out  a  subject,  now  both  theoretically  and  practically 
the  most  important  for  each  of  them. 

When  Humboldt  left  Jena  to  go  to  Italy  for  a 
couple  of  years,  Schiller  wrote  despondingly  to  Goethe. 
"  Here,  then,  is  another  connection  that  must  be  re- 
garded as  closed :  two  years,  so  differently  spent,  can- 
not but  alter  much  in  u.s,  and  therefore  between  us." 
Alas !  the  prehminary  peace  just  then  concluded,  for 
which  Schiller  was  heartily  thankful,  threatened  also 
to  rob  him  for  a  considerable  time  of  his  Weimar 
friend  and  brother  in  art.  It  was  not  until  May  2d 
that  Schiller  took  possession  of  his  garden.  Tired 
with  the  work  of  moving,  he  wrote  the  same  even- 
ing to  Goethe :  "  A  lovely  landscape  lies  around  me ; 
the  sun  goes  kindly  down ;  the  nightingales  warble. 
Everything  about  me  cheers,  and  the  first  evening  on 
my  own  freehold  is  of  the  happiest  omen.  .  .  .  To- 
morrow I  hope  to  set  to  work  ["  on  Wallenstein  "]  with 
real  zest,  and  keep  to  it."  At  the  same  time  he  was 
thinking  of  a  ballad  for  the  "  Almauach,"  and  for  that 
purpose   wished  to   see   the   libretto   of  "Don   Juan." 


400  THH   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

The  next  day  he  asked  for  the  German  translation  of 
Aristotle's  Poetics,  which  Goethe  had  spoken  of  with  so 
high  esteem ;  he  was  so  gratified  with  it  that  he 
wanted  to  get  the  book  for  himself.  In  his  new 
quarters  he  felt  remarkably  well,  pacing  the  garden 
by  the  hour,  even  in  wind  and  rain.  To  be  sure,  the 
inclement  weather  robbed  him  of  the  real  charm  of  a 
country  residence.  Goethe,  ever  since  the  peace 
opened  to  him  the  prospect  of  Italy,  had  felt  himself 
in  a  wonderfully  clear  frame  of  mind.  "  Let  us,"  he 
wi'ote  to  his  one  friend,  "  let  us,  as  long  as  we  remain 
together,  be  bringing  our  duality  more  and  more  into 
unison,  and  then  even  a  long  separation  can  in  no  way 
harm  our  mutual  relationship."  He  had  in  his  mind 
Schiller's  expression  on  being  parted  from  Humboldt. 

At  length  on  May  20th  he  came  over  to  stay  some 
time.  Again  the  evenings  were  mostly  spent  at  Schil- 
ler's house,  who  the  first  few  days  was  a  good  deal 
disturbed  by  visitors.  While  he  composed  some  things 
for  the  "  Almanach,"  SchiUer  was  finishing  the  rhymed 
prologue  to  his  play,  i.  e.  "  Wallenstein's  Camp,"  which 
was  afterward  made  half  as  long  again.  Goethe  was 
greatly  pleased  with  it  when  Schiller  read  it  out  to 
him  on  the  27th. 

The  way  in  which  Friedrich  Schlegel  kept  falling 
foul  of  the  Iforen,  specially  twitting  it  with  dealing 
so  largely  in  translation,  had  so  exasperated  Schiller, 
that  on  the  31st,  in  writing  to  the  elder  brother  Wil- 
helm,  then  just  returned  from  a  journey  to  Dresden, 
he  enclosed  the  small  arrears  due  to  him  for  literary 
work,  and  broke  off  all  friendly  connection  with  him. 
"  It  has  been  a  pleasure  to  me,"  he  wrote,  "  by  insert- 
ing your  translations  from  Dante  and  Shakespeare,  to 
give  you  the  opportunity  of  earning  a  remuneration 
(thirty  thalers  a  sheet)  that  is  not  to  be  had  every- 
where. But  as  I  cannot  help  knowing  that  at  the 
very  time  when  I  am  procuring  you  this  benefit,  Herr 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  401 

Tr.  Schlegel  censures  me  for  it,  and  finds  too  many 
translations  in  the  Horen,  you  will  for  the  future 
excuse  me.  And  once  for  all,  to  relieve  you  from  a 
position  that  cannot  but  be  irksome  to  a  candid  dis- 
position and  dehcate  sentiments,  allow  me  to  break  off 
entirely  a  connection  that  under  the  circumstances  is 
really  too  painful,  and  has  already  too  often  exposed 
my  confidence  to  misconstruction."  Wilhelm,  not  a 
little  astonished,  replied  that  he  himself  disapproved 
his  brother's  conduct,  and  would  have  wished  him  to 
leave  the  ridicule  of  the  "  Xenien  "  unanswered.  The 
report  circulated  by  Woltmann  that  his  wife  had  had 
a  hand  ia  reviewing  the  Horen,  was  a  slander.  He 
himself  had  never  abused  Schiller's  confidence,  nor 
acted  inconsistently  with  a  due  sense  of  gratitude. 
But  to  his  request  that  he  might  be  allowed  in  person 
to  prove  his  innocence  Schiller  could  not  consent,  as 
he  knew  that  his  wife's  sharp  tongue  (whom  he  used 
to  call  Dame  Lucifer,  or  Mischief)  did  not  spare  him 
or  his  house,  and  that  she  was  in  league  with  her 
brother-in-law  against  him.  It  is  true  she  had  added 
a  postscript,  declaring  she  had  not  seen  that  review 
yet,  and  did  not  mix  herself  up  in  such  comphcated 
affairs ;  nay,  she  gave  an  assurance  of  her  sincere  love 
and  respect,  her  honest  and  unalterable  sentiments. 
But  Schiller  was  not  to  be  misled  by  this.  He 
answered :  "  Considering  the  strong  reasons  for  dissat- 
isfaction that  your  brother  has  given,  and  still  con- 
tinues to  give  me,  mutual  trust  cannot  subsist  between 
you  and  me.  A  connection  rendered  impossible  by  a 
natural  combination  of  circumstances  will  not  be  kept 
up  with  the  best  of  wills.  In  my  narrow  circle  of 
acquaintance  there  must  be  full  security  and  unlimited 
confidence ;  and  this,  after  what  has  happened,  cannot 
have  place  in  our  connection.  Better,  then,  that  we 
dissolve  it ;  it  is  an  unpleasant  necessity  to  which  we, 
both  blameless  as  I  hope,  must  give  way.     This  I  owe 


402  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

to  myself,  for  no  one  can  comprehend  how  I  can  be  at 
once  the  friend  of  your  house  and  the  object  of  your 
brother's  insults.  Assure  Frau  Schlegol  that  I  have 
never  taken  any  heed  of  the  silly  report  that  she  was 
the  author  of  that  review,  and  that  I  consider  her  quite 
too  sensible  to  mix  herself  up  with  such  matters." 
Caroline  felt  the  sting,  and  the  sternness  with  which 
Schiller  exercised  his  domestic  right. 

The  "  Prologue  "  finished,  he  turned  to  his  "  Alma- 
nach,"  for  which  he  wrote  a  few  shorter  poems.  On 
June  5th  he  began  his  first  ballad,  "  The  Diver,"  not 
completing  it  until  the  14th.  In  those  beautiful  sum- 
mer eveuiugs  he  had  many  deep  talks  with  Goethe. 
This  friend  carried  on  what  slight  communication 
there  was  with  Wilhelm  Schlegel,  whose  treatise  on 
"  Romeo  and  Juliet "  he  obtained  for  the  Horen,  and 
discussed  with  the  author  such  amendments  as  seemed 
needful.  He  also  asked  him  for  contributions  to  the 
"  Almanach."  Besides  Goethe  and  Herder,  Schlegel 
was  the  only  one  who  received  money  for  his  poems. 

After  Goethe's  departure  Schiller  wrote  "  The  Glove," 
and  "  The  Eing  of  Polycrates  ; "  he  busied  himself  also 
with  Vieilleville's  Memoirs,  which  Wolzogen  was  to 
work  up  for  the  Horcn.  Fortunately,  his  brother-in- 
law  dissuaded  him  from  at  once  beginning  fresh  build- 
ings in  the  garden.  Though  again  suffering  from 
spasms,  he  could  still  occasionally  devote  himself  to 
the  "  Almanach,"  which  offered  a  wholesome  change 
of  occupation.  Many  contributions  were  sent  in  for 
it,  and  for  the  Horcn,  that  taxed  his  critical  taste. 
Empty  poems  he  often  made  tolerable  by  a  stroke  of 
the  pen  through  several  stanzas. 

As  Wilhelm  Schlegel  all  this  time  had  sent  him 
nothing  for  the  "  Almanach,"  he  wrote  asking  him  to 
do  so.  And  now  he  himself  ventured  to  work  out  a 
long-cherished  idea;  it  was  the  "Bell-Founder's  Song," 
intended  for  music.     But  little  advance  was  made  with 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  403 

this  ere  he  felt  drawn  to  Weimar,  to  enjoy  all  he  could 
of  Goethe's  society  before  his  departure  to  Italy,  and 
to  read  his  latest  writings  to  the  Duchess  and  Frau 
von  Stein.  Indeed,  Schiller  was  always  wishful  to  live 
at  Weimar,  close  to  his  great  friend,  to  the  theatre,  his 
relations,  and  the  court.  But  unhappily  the  duke  had 
so  little  confidence  in  Schiller's  capacity  to  direct  the 
theatre,  that  when  Goethe  proposed  his  appointment 
during  his  own  absence,  he  received  an  emphatic  re- 
fusal. The  duchess  listened  delightedly  to  his  reading 
of  the  "  Prologue "  and  the  Ballads.  The  friends 
associated  much  with  Hht,  who  had  been  invited  from 
Eome  to  Berlin,  and  was  deeply  versed  in  the  plastic 
art  of  the  ancients ;  also  with  Bottiger,  by  whose  lit- 
erary and  antiquarian  lore  they  could  profit.  Goethe 
left  with  his  friend  the  materials  for  a  ballad,  "  The 
Cranes  of  Ibycus;"  it  should  be  the  talisman  of  their 
long  separation.  This  delightful  week  brought  them 
much  closer  to  each  other.  Goethe's  influence  on 
Schiller  betrays  itself  in  the  expressions  used  by  the 
latter,  writing  from  Jena :  "  I  may  well  hope  that  we 
shall  gradually  get  to  see  alike  in  everything  of  which 
an  account  can  be  given,  and  that  in  what  by  its  very 
nature  passes  comprehension  we  shall  remain  united  by 
feehug.  The  noblest  and  fruitfullest  way  I  can  utilise 
our  mutual  communications,  and  make  them  my  own, 
is  to  apply  them  at  once  to  the  tasks  of  the  time  being, 
and  turn  them  to  immediate  profit.  .  .  .  And  so  I  hope 
that  my  '  Wallen stein,'  and  anything  I  may  produce 
hereafter  of  importance,  is  destined  to  exhibit  and 
preserve  in  concreto  the  whole  range  of  what  has 
passed  into  my  nature  during  our  commercmm.  .  .  . 
I  shall  now  strive  first  of  all  to  get  those  songs  done 
for  the  '  Almanach,'  as  the  composers  [Zumsteeg  and 
Zelter]  are  so  urgent ;  then  try  my  luck  on  the 
'  Cranes,'  and  with  September  return  to  tragedy." 
How  gladly  he    would  have   kept   Goethe   back,  he 


404  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

dared  not  betray  to  the  friend,  who  was  longing  for 
Italy,  for  it  would  have  damped  his  pleasure.  But  in 
a  letter  to  Meyer  Schiller  frankly  declared  that  Goethe, 
at  the  height  he  had  now  reached,  ought  rather  to 
think  of  bringing  into  full  view  the  beauty  of  form  he 
had  realised,  than  of  gomg  in  quest  of  new  material ; 
he  ought  now  to  live  entirely  for  the  practice  of 
poetry ;  whatever  he  might  gain  in  Italy  for  certain 
objects  was  so  much  lost  to  his  highest  and  ultimate  end. 
While  Goethe's  departure  was  delayed  till  July  30th, 
Schiller  had  his  hands  full  with  editing  the  "  Alma- 
nach  "  and  the  Horen,  as  weU  as  an  edition  of  "  Agnes 
von  Lihen  "  which  Unger  of  Berlin  had  undertaken. 
He  also  wrote  a  new  mediaeval  ballad,  "  Knight  Toggen- 
burg."  With  August  began  the  printing  of  the  "Al- 
manach,"  but  during  the  next  six  weeks  he  feU  ill  again, 
suffering  more  perhaps  than  ever  before.  He  could 
not  succeed  with  the  "  Songs  "  he  had  planned  writing, 
but  on  the  other  hand  he  put  all  his  powers  into  "  The 
Cranes  of  Ibycus,"  about  whicli  Goethe  was  often  con- 
sulted. These  letters  of  his  friend  were  infinitely  cheer- 
ing to  him  in  his  loneliness  ;  and  they  were  the  more 
welcome  when  from  time  to  time  they  contained  lyrics 
which  should  enrich  the  forthcoming  "  Almanach."  He 
was  glad,  too,  that  Goethe  and  Cotta  had  grown  more  in- 
timate ;  this  might  probably  lead  to  a  business  connec- 
tion. At  length,  in  mid-September,  though  his  cough 
never  left  him,  Schiller  felt  a  return  of  life  and  vigour. 
Then,  just  before  the  "  Almanach  "  was  finished,  there 
came  into  his  hands  a  highly  promising  legendary 
theme,  which  with  astonishing  facility,  considering  the 
kind  was  quite  new  to  him,  he  worked  up  into  his 
"  Walk  to  the  Iron  Foundry."  This  time  the  strongest 
things  in  the  "  Almanach "  would  be  ballads  by  the 
two  aUied  poets.  "  Oberon's  Golden  Wedding,"  in 
which  Goethe  had  ridiculed  some  false  tendencies  of 
the  time,  Schiller,  from  a  love  of  peace,  left  out. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  405 

When  the  "  Alinanach "  was  complete,  he  turned 
again  to  "  Wallenstein,"  and  was  dehghted  to  find  that 
he  had  converted  the  historical  material  into  a  purely 
tragic  fable,  whose  action  hurried  with  a  continuous 
and  increasingly  rapid  movement  to  its  end.  There 
was  a  baldness  about  some  of  the  scenes  already 
written  out  which  he  hoped  to  remove,  but  he  feared 
that  the  play  could  not  be  finished  until  the  end  of 
May.  He  felt  infinitely  cheered  by  Goethe's  resolution 
to  return  to  Weimar  before  winter.  Schiller  him- 
self thought  of  spending  some  time  there  and  attending 
the  theatre.  Before  the  month  was  out  he  had  moved 
into  the  town.  He  was  unspeakably  charmed  with 
Goethe's  "  Epos,"  and  he  determined  to  write  "  Wal- 
lenstein "  in  blank  verse.  On  November  4th  he  began 
recasting  the  scenes  previously  done  in  prose,  and  now, 
thanks  to  the  poetic  form,  things  began  to  wear  quite 
another  look. 

On  the  20th  Goethe  and  Meyer  halted  at  Jena  for  a 
couple  of  hours  on  their  way  home.  Schiller  promised 
to  come  with  the  opening  year  to  Weimar,  where  he 
hoped  to  pass  an  entertaining  and  instructive  winter 
with  Goethe,  who  had  brought  home  from  his  travels 
such  a  store  of  new  ideas  and  objects  of  art.  In  partic- 
ular they  would  try  and  effect  something  for  the  theatre, 
even  if  nobody  grew  the  vriser  by  it  but  themselves. 
Before  this,  Schiller  had  offered  to  supply  linger,  the 
Berhn  publisher,  with  a  "  Theater-Kalender,"  which 
should  concern  itself  with  everything  that  theoretically 
or  practically  pertained  to  dramatic  and  theatric  art. 
But  his  fluctuating  health,  the  cramped  lodgings  to 
which  he  was  going  at  Weimar,  and  above  all  the 
"  Wallenstein  "  work,  which  demanded  solitary  seclu- 
sion, kept  him  back  at  Jena.  And  there  Goethe  meant 
to  visit  him  at  the  beginning  of  the  year,  for  at  Weimar 
he  could  not  get  his  thoughts  settled  and  his  powers 
collected.       Schiller    writes   to   him,   December    8th : 


4o6  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

"  Happily  my  infirm  health  does  not  affect  my  [mental] 
mood ;  what  it  does  is  this,  that  when  I  throw  my  soul 
into  anything,  it  exhausts  me  sooner  and  deranges  my 
system.  Hence  1  usually  have  to  pay  for  one  day 
of  happy  attunement  with  five  or  six  of  oppression  and 
suffering."  But  nothing  could  daunt  his  cheerful 
courage  ;  he  still  hoped  to  see  "  Wallenstein "  played 
the  next  summer,  and  immediately  after  he  would  go 
on  with  his  "  Knights."  About  the  love-scenes,  indeed, 
he  had  strong  misgivings  when  he  thought  of  the 
theatric  destination  of  the  piece;  for  love,  such  as 
it  had  to  appear  there,  was  anything  but  theatrical. 
When  immediately  after  this  a  severe  attack  made  him 
for  some  time  incapable  of  all  strenuous  effort,  he 
employed  the  leisure  left  him  from  the  editing  of  the 
Horen  in  revising  his  "  Ghostseer "  for  a  new  edition. 
It  was  only  at  the  end  of  the  year  that,  in  spite  of 
the  terrible  weather  afflicting  him,  he  went  back  to 
"  Wallenstein." 

On  New  Year's  Day,  1798,  it  was  a  great  joy  to  him 
to  see  the  first  two  acts  lying  before  him,  copied  fair  in 
another's  handwriting.  "  It  is  clear  as  day  to  me,"  he 
tells  Goethe  on  January  5th, "  that  I  have  gone  beyond 
myself ;  and  this  is  the  fruit  of  our  intercourse.  For 
nothing  but  frequent  and  continuous  converse  with 
a  nature  so  objective  and  opposite  to  mine,  together 
with  my  own  vehement  yearning  after  it  and  the  accom- 
panying effort  to  look  upon  it  and  think  it,  could  have 
enabled  me  so  to  widen  out  my  subjective  limits.  I 
find  that  the  clearness,  the  though tfulness  wliich  is  the 
fruit  of  a  later  period,  has  cost  me  none  of  the  warmth 
of  an  earlier."  If  he  had  succeeded,  which  he  did  not 
at  all  doubt,  in  winning  the  favour  of  the  public  by  his 
dramas,  he  would  like  for  once  "  to  do  something  regu- 
larly bad,"  and  bring,  as  he  had  once  intended,  his 
"  Julian  the  Apostate "  on  the  stage.  The  plan  of 
giving  up  the  Horen,  which  Cotta  pressed  upon  him, 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  407 

pleased  him  well ;  it  would  set  him  free  from  many 
teasiug  cares,  and  he  could  then  devote  himself  entirely 
to  his  drama.  Goethe  delayed  his  coming,  but  letters 
passed  the  brisker  between  them,  especially  as  the 
Weimar  poet  had  now  won  Schiller's  sympathy  for  his 
experiments  in  natural  science.  When  half  the  month 
was  gone,  and  just  as  his  "  Walleu stein  "  was  in  excellent 
train,  the  poet  was  taken  with  a  violent  sore  throat, 
then  going  the  round  of  the  house.  "  How  I  shall 
thank  Heaven,"  he  writes  to  Korner,  "  when  this 
'  Walleustein '  is  off  my  hands  and  clear  of  my  desk ! 
It  is  a  [very]  sea  to  be  drunk  up,  and  many  a  time  I 
do  not  see  to  the  end  of  it.  Had  I  ten  weeks  of  unin- 
terrupted health  it  would  be  done."  But  soon  his 
better  mood  set  in  again.  On  the  26th  he  notified  to 
Goethe :  "  I  have  just  signed  in  due  form  the  death- 
warrant  of  the  three  goddesses  Eunomia,  Dike,  and 
Irene  [the  Horeii\.  Dedicate  to  these  noble  Dead 
a  pious  Christian  tear ;  but  condolence  is  forbidden." 
He  had  just  sent  Cotta  a  manifesto  on  the  cessation  of 
the  Horcn,  which  that  publisher  should  make  use  of  in 
a  circular  on  the  subject  addressed  to  the  trade.  Feb- 
ruary, alas !  brought  back  the  catarrhal  complaint  and 
spasms,  which  unfitted  him  for  any  exertion,  and  made 
him  the  more  impatient,  as  inquiries  for  "  Walleustein  " 
began  to  pour  in  upon  liim  from  without.  Schroder,  it 
appeared,  was  willing  to  play  the  part  of  the  hero  upon 
the  Weimar  boards,  and  the  Berlin  theatre  offered  to 
pay  any  sum  in  order  to  get  the  piece  before  it  was 
printed.  With  characteristic  strength  of  will,  Schiller 
gathered  his  powers  together.  By  the  end  of  February 
he  was  already  "  in  the  deepest  vortex  of  the  action," 
and  the  dSnouement  of  the  last  act.  The  fine  days  that 
followed  drew  him  for  the  first  time  out  into  the  air, 
which  did  him  good.  A  vehement  longing  seized  him 
for  his  garden  residence ;  he  was  already  planning 
buildings  to  be  set  up  there,  a  nice  bath  in  one  of  the 


4o8  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

summer-houses,  a  pavilion  and  the  addition  of  a  new 
story  to  the  house  from  which  (for  there  he  meant  to 
live  himself)  he  would  have  a  lovely  view  of  the  Leutra 
valley.     He  had   already  had  a   commodious  kitchen 
built,  the  autumn  before,  on  the  site  of  the  northern 
summer-house.     To    pay   for    the    new    buildings    he 
begged  Cotta  to  advance  him  five  hundred  thalers  at 
the  beginning  of  April.     "  But  to  get  our  account  per- 
fectly balanced  this  year,"  so  he  wrote  on  March  5th, 
"  as  soon  as  '  Wallenstein '  and  the  new  '  Musen  Alma- 
nach'  are  done  with,  I  shall  immediately  set  about 
the   revision    of    '  Fiesco,'    the  '  Robbers,'     and    '  Plot 
and  Passion.'      The  '  Wallenstein '  itself  will,  as  far 
as  I  am  al)le  to  judge  at  present,  take  up  nearly  twenty 
sheets."    An  edition  of  his  "  Dramatic  Works,"  in  which 
the  youthful  plays  were  to  be  newly  worked  up,  was 
what  he  had  promised  to  Cotta  long  before.     At  this 
time  also  there  fell  to  him,  if  somewhat  late  in  the  day, 
two  tokens  of  honour.     Campe,  on  behalf  of  the  French 
government,  sent  him  the  Citizen  Franchise,  which  had 
been  issued  actually   by  Koland,  and  transmitted   to 
Custine  to  be  forwarded,  but  had  lain  at  Strasburg  ever 
since.       The  Coburg  government  had  just    issued  its 
Rescript  (withheld  by  it  for  two  years  and  now  extorted 
by  the  Duke  of  Weimar)  touching  the  nomination  of 
Schiller    as    honorary    professor    in    ordinary,    which 
Meiningen,  Gotha,  and  Weimar  had  granted  long  be- 
fore ;  so  now  at  last  the  senate  was  able  to  send  him 
the  diploma.     The  Patent  of  Citizenship   he   at   the 
duke's  request  presented  to  the  Weimar  hbrary.     He 
now  had  himself  entered  in  the  directory  as  a  citizen  of 
the  French  Republic. 

Three-fourths  of  "  Wallenstein  "  were  complete  when 
Goethe  at  length  came  to  Jena  on  March  20th,  and 
stayed  until  April  6th.  He  thought  the  three  acts 
excellent,  in  some  passages  astonishing,  only  he  saw 
no  possibihty  of  confining  them  within  stage  limits. 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  409 

The  chief  subject  of  conversation  was  the  Disquisitions 
on  Art  and  Science,  which  Goethe  was  going  to  bring 
out  jointly  with  Meyer,  and  in  which  Schiller  also 
had  a  share  assigned  to  him,  Friedrich  Schlegel  was 
away  at  Berlin,  and  his  brother  was  soon  to  set  out 
for  Dresden.  Goethe,  while  yet  at  Weimar,  had  written 
to  Schiller,  that  when  he  came  over,  he  would  propose 
to  him  to  see  Wilhelm  Schlegel  twice  or  thrice  before 
he  started,  lest  in  displeasure  he  should  withhold  his 
contributions  from  the  "  Almanach."  He  now  asked 
if  Schiller  was  still  bent  on  keeping  him  under  the 
ban.  As  he  himself  had  to  see  both  Schlegel  and 
the  painter  Tischbein,  who  wished  to  call  upon  Schiller, 
he  would  hke  to  know,  for  he  was  expected  to  act  as 
mediator.  There  would  be  a  capital  opportunity  now, 
if  Schlegel  were  to  call  with  Tischbein ;  as  he  would 
be  away  all  the  summer,  no  iutrusiveness  need  be 
dreaded  from  him.  But  Schiller,  who  looked  for  no 
good  thing  at  the  hands  of  Schlegel,  or  of  the  vdfe  that 
ruled  him,  did  not  care,  for  the  sake  of  a  few  articles 
in  the  "Almanach,"  to  renew  the  acquaintanceship. 
Both  he  and  Lotte  had  long  felt  a  hearty  dislike  to 
the  two  brothers,  whom  he  thought  devoid  of  right 
feeling. 

After  Goethe's  departure,  Schiller  was  going  to  bend 
all  his  powers  to  the  "  Wallenstein,"  in  which  he  now 
hoped  to  conquer  even  the  theatrical  difficulties.  But 
as  early  as  April  11th  he  had  an  attack  of  catarrhal 
fever  which  lasted  a  fortnight,  and  brought  him  so  low 
that  he  was  forced  to  miss  Iffland's  "  star  "  performance 
on  the  Weimar  stage.  These  would  have  been  a  great 
stimulus  to  him  just  now,  although  in  Iffland  he  did 
not  see  an  artist  of  genius.  Schroder  had  far  greater 
qualities  as  an  actor,  but  he  was  keeping  silence,  to 
Schiller's  growing  vexation.  In  vain  did  Goethe  rally 
him :  "  You  write  '  Wallenstein,'  and  Schroder  will 
come."      Schiller  now  would  not  hear  a  word  of  any 


4IO  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

performance  of  his  play ;  even  if  Schroder  came,  three 
of  the  leading  characters  would  be  spoiled  for  want  of 
good  actors.  Goethe  offered  no  contradiction,  as  he 
despaired  of  the  play  being  made  actable. 

In  spite  of  unsettled  weather,  Schiller  moved  to  his 
garden  on  May  7th,  hoping  there  to  catch  the  mood 
for  composition.  The  pleasant  day  he  spent  with 
Cotta  on  his  way  home  from  Leipzig  drew  him  still 
nearer  to  that  friend.  Cotta's  loving  care  for  the  poet, 
whose  friendship  he  regarded  as  his  greatest  good 
fortune,  showed  itself  in  the  anxiety  he  felt  during  a 
violent  thunder-storm  that  overtook  him  on  his  home- 
ward journey,  when  he  pictured  to  himself  the  poet  in 
his  lonely  garden  house.  He  immediately  begged 
Wolzogen  to  erect  in  it,  at  his  cost,  and  as  quickly  as 
possible,  a  lightning  conductor  constructed  on  the  best 
principles,  "  as  a  sign  of  his  undying  gratitude." 

On  the  20th  came  Goethe,  who,  with  a  brief  inter- 
ruption, remained  a  month.  At  the  stone  table  in 
the  arbour  there  was  many  a  good  and  great  word 
exchanged  between  the  notable  pair,  as  Goethe  told 
Eckermann  thirty  years  after.  Only  when  the  north 
wind  would  blow  sometimes  on  the  finest  of  evenings, 
scattering  the  kitchen-smoke  all  across  the  garden,  it 
often  drove  Goethe  to  despair.  Schiller  took  a  lively 
interest  in  his  friend's  "  Achilleis ; "  he  also  carried  on 
the  negotiation  with  Cotta,  which  much  interested 
Goethe,  concerning  his  work  on  Art  and  Science.  He 
suggested  that  it  be  named  "  The  Artist,"  but  Meyer's 
title  of  "  Propyla^a  "  was  preferred.  Humboldt's  manu- 
script work  on  "  Hermann  und  Dorothea,"  which 
Schiller  was  to  get  printed  for  him,  prompted  many 
aesthetic  meditations.  And  in  Goethe's  "  Theory  of 
Colours"  and  his  experiments  on  Magnetism  both 
Schiller  and  Lotte  took  an  eager  interest.  To  them 
indeed  he  was  the  most  intimate  and  entertaining  of 
family  friends.      He  undertook  with  Meyer  to  design 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  411 

the  cover  and  frontispiece  to  the  "  Almanach,"  He 
finished  some  splendid  poems  for  it  during  the  last 
days  of  this  visit,  while  Schiller  grew  ever  more 
distressed  over  the  "  Wallensteiu,"  which  would  keep 
expanding,  and  changing  form.  On  June  15th  he 
writes  in  depression  to  Korner :  "  One  ought  to  be 
careful  how  one  ever  takes  up  such  a  compli- 
cated, endless,  thankless  task  as  my  '  Wallenstein,' 
where  the  writer  has  to  squander  all  his  poetic  re- 
sources to  put  some  life  into  a  stubborn  material. 
This  labour  robs  me  of  all  the  comfort  of  my  life ;  it 
pins  me  tightly  down  to  one  point,  and  leaves  me  no 
chance  of  taking  in  other  impressions,  for  I  am  also 
haunted  by  the  thought  of  getting  done  by  a  certain 
time."  And  now,  as  a  climax,  he  had  once  more 
to  put  his  drama  aside,  and  give  attention  to  the 
"  Almanach." 

This  he  took  up  three  days  after  Goethe's  departure, 
yet  he  could  not  fall  into  the  proper  mood.  He  had 
some  exquisite  pieces  of  Goethe's,  while  much  that 
was  available  had  come  in  from  others.  From  Berlin, 
Wilhelm  Schlegel  had  sent  Goethe  a  couple  of  short 
"  Occasional  Poems,"  with  the  remark  that  at  any  rate 
they  would  deserve  a  place  in  the  "  Almanach."  But 
Schiller  thought  he  could  not  accept  them  unless 
Schlegel  sent  another  contribution,  expressly  for  the 
Horen.  "  I  have  met  with  so  little  civility  at  the 
hands  of  that  family,"  he  remarked,  "  that  I  must  really 
guard  against  giving  them  an  opportunity  of  assuming 
any  consequence ;  the  very  least  I  should  risk  would 
be,  that  Frau  S.  would  assure  everybody  that  her 
husband  did  not  work  for  the  '  Almanach,'  but  that  I 
had  pounced  upon  the  two  printed  poems  just  to  give 
it  a  hft."  About  this  time  he  wrote  thanking  Hum- 
boldt in  a  highly  appreciative  tone  for  the  book  he 
had  sent,  though  he  did  not  hide  the  divergence  of 
their  views.      "  Goethe  and  I,"  said  he,  "  have  drawn 


412  THE  LIFE   OF   SCHILLER 

the  line  between  Epic  and  Dramatic  poetry  in  a  simpler 
way  than  your  method  permitted  you,  and  we  do  not 
make  the  difference  anything  hke  so  great.  Thus  we 
cannot  allow  that  Tragedy  shades  off  so  much  into 
the  Lyric;  it  is  absolutely  plastic,  like  the  Epos. 
Goethe  is  even  of  opinion  that  it  stands  related  to 
Epopteia  as  Sculpture  does  to  Painting."  In  the  error 
that  he  notices  in  Humboldt's  view,  he  believes  he 
can  trace  his  own  influence.  "  In  fact,  our  common 
endeavour  to  form  elementary  conceptions  in  aesthetic 
things  led  us  to  apply  the  metaphysic  of  art  too 
immediately  to  objects,  and  to  handle  it  as  a  practical 
tool,  for  which  it  is  far  from  being  fitted.  This  has 
often  happened  to  myself,  as  in  the  case  of  Burger 
and  Matthisson,  and  especially  in  my  Horen  articles." 
So  frankly  did  he  confess  how  far  the  influence  of 
Goethe's  realistic  views  had  carried  him. 

This  friend  came  back  to  Jena  on  July  4th,  but 
only  a  week  had  passed  when  his  affairs  drew  him 
away  again  to  Weimar.  He  left  his  August  behind, 
and  the  boy  often  came  to  play  with  the  children  in 
Schiller's  garden.  The  poet  now  busied  himself  with 
revising  "  The  Ghostseer,"  and  with  editing  the  "  Alma- 
nach,"  toward  which  Matthisson  had  given  much,  while 
Herder,  in  dudgeon  with  the  Dioscuri,  held  aloof.  He 
was  pleased  with  the  contributions  of  Luise  Brachmann, 
whom  Hardenberg  had  recommended  to  him,  so  that 
he  even  expressed  a  desire  for  her  personal  acquaint- 
ance. On  the  afternoon  of  the  11th  (it  was  Ernst's 
birthday)  the  little  house  in  the  garden  was  being  set 
straight.  He  got  on  very  slowly,  however,  with  the 
building  of  the  new  story,  being  short  of  workmen ; 
however,  on  the  18th  he  was  safe  under  shelter  again. 
Unfortunately  the  spasms  returned,  but  he  fought 
against  the  suffering,  helped  in  this  by  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  his  family  comfortably  housed.  He  had  already 
had  a  one-story  pavilion   built  for   himself;   on   the 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  413 

second  floor  of  the  house  were  one  large  and  two 
smaller  rooms  fitted  up  for  him,  while  Lotte  occupied 
the  first  floor,  and  the  children  and  servants  lived 
down-stairs.  He  had  in  his  service  the  trusty  Christine 
Wezel  of  Neckarrems,  who  had  come  with  him  from 
Suabia,  her  younger  sister,  and  Gottfried  Rudolf,  his 
devoted  henchman,  of  whom  a  life  of  the  poet  must 
needs  give  grateful  mention.  On  Schiller's  death  he 
took  service  with  Cotta,  though  he  could  not  forget 
Weimar ;  and  for  many  years  he  was  employed  by  the 
hereditary  princess.  Christine,  whom  they  looked 
upon  as  one  of  the  family,  died  in  Lotte's  service  in 
1814. 

As  he  had  not  even  yet  achieved  anything  in  the 
lyrical  way,  Schiller  fell  back  upon  "  "Wallenstein,"  but 
this  also  he  had  soon  to  lay  aside.  The  printing  of 
the  "  Almanach  "  had  now  begun.  The  "  Athenaum  " 
of  the  two  Schlegels  having  just  come  out,  their  "  pert, 
dictatorial,  slashing,  one-sided  manner,"  gave  Schiller 
almost  physical  pain,  though  a  certain  earnestness  and 
somewhat  deep  penetration  were  not  wanting,  espe- 
cially to  the  younger ;  merits,  as  he  said,  alloyed  with 
many  egotistic  and  repulsive  ingi'edients.  In  their 
aesthetic  judgments  there  was  a  great  baldness,  barren- 
ness ;  stress  of  words,  with  httle  of  matter.  This  style, 
he  thought,  would  retard  rather  than  hasten  the  advent 
of  a  healthy  pubhc  taste  for  the  good  and  the  right  in 
poetry.  Goethe  would  not  give  up  his  sense  of  the 
importance  of  the  Schlegels  in  promoting  a  purer  taste 
as  compared  with  the  common  run  of  soulless  critics ; 
however,  he  reserved  what  he  had  to  say  in  their 
defence  for  a  personal  interview.  He  could  not  much 
commend  the  poem  Wilhelm  had  sent  to  the  "  Alma- 
nach ; "  at  the  same  time  he  hoped  to  induce  him  to 
rewrite  it.  That  Schiller  might  so  speed  with  the 
"  Wallenstein  "  that  the  newly  restored  theatre  could 
be  opened  with  it,  proved,  alas !  but  a  futile  wish. 


414  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

At  last  Schiller  felt  in  the  key  for  lyric-writing. 
He  had  composed  his  "Hymn  on  the  Power  of  For- 
tune," and  was  at  work  upon  another  poem,  when 
Goethe's  arrival,  on  the  evening  of  July  31st,  led  him 
back  to  "  Wallenstein,"  and  the  day  before  he  left 
(August  15th)  he  was  able  to  read  to  him  the  last  two 
acts.  But  then  work  at  the  "  Almanach  "  once  more 
harassed  him,  and  he  now  resolved  to  give  it  up 
entirely  after  the  next  year.  Writing  to  Korner,  he 
says :  "  The  indifference  of  the  public  to  lyric  poetry, 
and  its  cold  reception  of  my  '  Almanach,'  which 
merited  something  better,  do  not  make  me  particularly 
anxious  to  continue  it;  therefore,  when  'Wallenstein' 
is  done,  I  shall  keep  to  drama,  and  in  leisure  hours 
carry  on  critical  and  theoretical  labours."  Despite  his 
discontent  and  the  bad  weather,  which  made  a  sojourn 
in  his  rickety  garden-house  almost  intolerable,  he  pro- 
duced in  the  course  of  three  weeks  two  ballads  that 
again  struck  a  quite  original  key,  the  "  Fight  with  the 
Dragon,"  and  the  "  Suretyship."  He  also  completed 
his  Citizen-song  (from  the  "  Eleusinian  Feast ").  Dur- 
ing the  same  time  occurred  his  house-warming,  on  a 
terrible  stormy  25th  of  August,  when  he  was  gladdened 
by  a  visit  from  Fichte,  with  whom  he  was  now  desir- 
ous to  try  and  keep  on  at  least  good-humoured  and 
pleasant  terms. 

By  September  8th  he  was  back  at  his  "  Wallen- 
stein," meaning  to  utilise  the  remainder  of  the  mild 
season  for  the  love-scenes,  to  which  winter  supplied  no 
stimulus,  seeing  that  he  was  not  so  happily  constituted 
as  Jean  Paul,  who  could  draw  his  inspiration  from  the 
coffee-pot.  His  residence  in  Goethe's  house  from  the 
10th  to  the  15th  determined  the  fate  of  "Wallenstein." 
It  was  there  that  he  resolved  to  have  the  "  Prologue  "  or 
"  Prelude  "  ready  for  the  opening  of  the  restored  theatre 
in  four  weeks'  time  from  then,  and  to  cut  the  drama 
itself  into  two  parts,  which  should  be  ready  for  per- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  415 

formance  before  the  winter  was  out.  For  this  solu- 
tion of  the  Gordian  knot,  and  for  what  followed  out 
of  it,  we  have  to  thank  Goethe,  who  kept  insisting 
that  what  a  man  wills  to  do  he  can  do.  There  was 
no  time  to  lose,  indeed,  for  the  "  Prelude,"  to  stand  by 
itself,  had  to  be  considerably  enlarged.  Goethe  did 
not  let  him  want  for  encouragement ;  he  came  to  Jena 
himself,  where  on  Michaelmas  Day  he  snatched  the 
"  Wallenstein's  Camp  "  from  Schiller's  hesitating  hand  ; 
ay,  and  even  made  him  write  a  "  Prologue "  bearing 
upon  it  for  the  reopening  of  the  theatre.  And  by  the 
4th  of  October  Schiller  actually  was  able  to  send  this 
to  his  friend,  then  gone  back  again  to  Weimar. 

The  evening  before,  our  poet  had  formed  an  acquaint- 
ance which  sufficiently  surprised  him,  in  the  person 
of  Johann  Baptist  Lacher,  a  young  fellow  countryman. 
Born  at  Wurzach  in  1776,  and  the  son  of  a  needy  musi- 
cian, he  had  g6t  the  notion  fixed  in  his  head  that  Ger- 
many, like  France,  ought  to  achieve  Unity  and  Civil 
Equality.  Attracted  by  Fichte's  summons,  he  had 
hastened  in  the  previous  October  to  Jena,  to  gather  a 
band  of  like-minded  men,  and  turn  his  country  upside 
down.  Faihng  that,  he  was  resolved  to  commence  in 
the  ranks  of  the  French  army  his  training  for  his 
future  career.  Of  course  the  plan  came  to  nothing, 
though  he  had  the  warmest  sympathy  of  Fichte,  Her- 
der, and  his  two  compatriots,  Wieland  and  Paulus,  to 
cheer  him  on.  The  contest  for  a  college  bursary  hav- 
ing gone  against  him,  he  was  now  starting  for  Paris. 
Before  leaving  Jena,  where  the  sale  of  his  chattels  had 
realised  fifty  gulden  in  cash,  he  presented  himself  as  a 
Suabian  wishing  to  revolutionise  Germany,  and  with 
an  introduction  from  Paulus,  before  his  favourite  poet 
and  countryman,  who  had  "  played  such  bewitching 
music  on  his  heart's  most  hidden  chords."  Lacher 
himself,  ten  years  after,  related  the  interview.  "  A  tall, 
thin  but  muscular  man   stood  in   the  middle  of  the 


4i6  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

room ;  a  drab  overcoat  covered  his  body,  though  the 
shirt-collar  was  open.  Yellow  hair,  cut  short,  waved 
about  his  high,  broad  forehead ;  the  eyes  are  blue, 
soft,  and  serious ;  the  nose  somewhat  aquiline,  with  a 
crease  where  it  joins  the  forehead ;  his  countenance  is 
pale  ;  an  extremely  fascinating,  honest  mouth  ;  and  the 
whole  man  instinct  with  zeal  and  kindliness."  Schil- 
ler listened  smihng  while  the  young  dreamer  in  in- 
nocent, blunt  fashion  unfolded  his  plan.  The  advice, 
that  he  should  first  acquire  some  knowledge  at  least  of 
French  and  of  the  military  profession,  he  would  not 
accept,  even  when  Schiller  hinted  at  the  possibihty  of 
providing  for  his  immediate  maintenance.  As  he  was 
determined  to  set  out  on  the  5th,  Schiller  invited  him 
to  supper  the  next  evening,  at  which  the  strange  revo- 
lutionary found  both  the  "  right  amiable  "  hostess  and 
Professor  Niethammer ;  for  Schiller  wished  to  "  cele- 
brate a  feast  of  Suabians."  Lotte  could  not  help  laugh- 
ing heartily  at  the  simple,  frank  way  in  which  the 
patriot,  warmed  somewhat  by  wine,  recounted  to  them 
the  story  of  his  life.  When  he  spoke  of  his  former 
fantastic  scheme  of  rousing  the  nation  to  assert  itself, 
to  suppress  aU  the  minor  princes,  and  bring  Germany 
to  unity,  and  thereby  to  political  independence  abroad 
and  prosperity  at  home,  Schiller  cried  out :  "0  me ! 
for  goodness'  sake  leave  me  my  poor  little  garden- 
house  standing ! "  Nor  were  more  serious  warnings 
wanting  on  his  part;  yet  they  failed  to  touch  the 
young  enthusiast,  as  noble-hearted  as  he  was  wrong- 
headed,  who  forgot  supper,  everything,  in  the  heat  of 
his  outpourings.  It  had  grown  late,  and  little  Karl 
was  asleep  on  his  father's  knee,  when  Lacher  thought 
of  withdrawing.  Schiller,  light  in  hand,  went  with 
him  to  the  steps,  and  spoke  the  parting  words,  which 
he  never  forgot :  "  Come  back  to  your  country  some 
day  with  your  French  blouse  and  your  German  heart." 
He  introduced  him  to    Cotta,  and  permitted    him  to 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  417 

correspond  with  himself.  Writing  to  Goethe,  Schiller 
speaks  of  this  "  quaint  original  of  a  politico-moral 
enthusiast"  as  a  man  full  of  good  intention,  of  great 
ability,  and  indomitable  physical  energy. 

At  the  same  time  there  came  to  Jena  another  re- 
markable Suabian,  Schelling,  whose  recent  appoint- 
ment to  the  University  had  been  obtained  partly  with 
Schiller's  help.  He  immediately  called  on  the  poet, 
and  showed  toward  him  great  warmth  of  feeling. 
Wilhelm  Schlegel  also  was  at  this  time  appointed 
professor. 

The  two  poets  were  zealously  pushing  forward  the 
completion  of  "  Wallenstein's  Camp,"  and  its  "  Pro- 
logue," for  their  production  on  the  stage.  Schiller  had 
appended  the  latter  to  his  already  finished  "  Almanach," 
wherein  was  announced  the  publication  by  Cotta  of 
all  three  parts  of  "  Walleustein,"  and  also  of  a  select, 
improved,  and  enlarged  collection  of  the  "  Poems." 
Goethe,  with  infinite  patience  and  good  humour,  directed 
the  rehearsals.  Schiller  brought  Lotte  to  the  dress 
rehearsal  on  the  11th,  to  wliich  several  friends  came. 
All  were  highly  delighted,  and  Goethe  showed  the 
warmest  interest,  while  Schiller  was  much  moved,  both 
by  the  fine  effect  of  the  play  and  by  Goethe's  sympathy. 
On  the  next  night  the  theatre  reopened  with  the  "  Pro- 
logue "  and  the  "  Prelude ; "  these  were  followed  by 
the  "  Corsicans "  of  the  Saxe-Weimar  poet,  Kotzebue. 
Schiller's  box  had  necessarily  been  removed  during  the 
alterations,  and  he  sat  in  the  open  balcony,  first  by  the 
side  of  Goethe,  and  afterward  next  the  ducal  box. 
Even  Caroline  Schlegel  was  obliged  to  admit  that  the 
acting  was  excellent,  and  also  that  everything  was 
pleasing  to  the  eye.  It  was  truly  a  triumph  for  the 
author  of  "  Don  Carlos,"  that  by  his  wholly  realistic 
"  Prelude  "  he  had  led  the  audience  away  into  Wallen- 
stein's world.  Caroline  might  sneer  at  will  about 
Goethe's  pupil  having  come  out  more  "  Goethesque " 


4i8  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

than  ever,  acliieving  after  years  of  labour  what  Goethe 
could  have  thrown  off  in  an  afternoon ;  her  husband 
might  joke  about  his  having  sold  himself  to  the  Evil 
One,  to  play  the  reahst  and  fend  off  sentiment.  But 
all  Jena,  so  far  as  it  had  any  poetic  sense,  was  witness 
of  its  poet's  triumph.  The  performance  was  repeated 
the  next  day  with  great  applause.  On  the  14th  Goethe 
came  to  Jena  for  a  week ;  here  he  finished  his  report 
of  the  opening  of  the  Weimar  theatre,  and  urged  the 
speedy  completion  of  the  "  Piccolomini."  But  the 
transcription  of  the  play  into  a  "  serviceable,  intelligi- 
ble, speakable  stage  language "  went  out  slowly ;  and 
there  was  much  both  to  add  and  to  alter.  Yet  Schiller 
was  already  thinking  of  selling  "  Wallenstein "  for 
translation  to  Bell,  the  London  pubhsher;  Cotta  sliould 
offer  it  to  him  for  £60.  He  had  indeed  offered  it  the 
year  before  to  the  tutor  Nohden,  who  had  already 
turned  "  Fiesco "  into  Enghsh  jointly  with  Stoddart ; 
but  a  prose  version  of  the  "  Carlos  "  by  the  latter  had 
proved  anything  but  satisfactory,  and  of  remuneration 
not  a  word  had  been  said.  Bell  had  brought  out  a 
translation  of  "  Plot  and  Passion,"  and  from  him,  as 
the  principal  publisher  of  the  translations  and  adapta- 
tions of  Kotzebue's  plays,  Cotta  was  hkely  to  obtain 
the  most  acceptable  terms. 

Not  till  he  had  moved  into  the  town  again,  on 
November  6th,  did  Schiller  begin  the  love-scenes  which 
he  had  kept  apart  from  the  political  action,  and  which 
he  had  intended  to  finish  when  in  the  garden-house, 
inspired  by  the  beauties  of  Nature  about  him.  Goethe 
was  dehghted  with  the  two  acts  sent  to  him,  and 
thought  the  first  one  almost  ready  for  the  stage.  On 
the  11th  he  managed  to  come  to  Jena  for  a  couple  of 
weeks,  and  again  regularly  spent  his  evenings  at 
Schiller's.  During  the  bad  weather  Schelling  fre- 
quently came  in  for  philosophical  discussion.  And 
now,  to   Schiller's  joy,  even  Kotzebue  was  asking  to 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  419 

have  the  "  Wallenstein  "  plays  for  the  Vienna  theatre. 
When  Goethe  was  absent,  our  poet  often  felt  the 
lonehness  and  monotony  of  his  life ;  but  he  made  an 
honest  use  of  his  time,  and  worked  at  his  play  with 
success.  He  was  resolved  to  finish  the  "  Piccolomini " 
by  the  end  of  the  year.  Hearing  that  most  of  the 
theatres  were  waiting  for  the  publication  of  the  play, 
before  bringing  it  on  the  stage,  he  put  off  the  printing 
of  it,  that  he  might  not  miss  advantageous  offers. 
Pressure  from  Iffland  on  the  24th  impelled  him  to 
summon  up  all  his  strength,  so  that  the  complete 
copy,  except  of  one  single  scene,  was  sent  off  that 
very  day.  "Hardly  another  for  thirty  miles  round 
has  spent  such  a  Holy  Eve,"  said  he,  writing  to  Goethe, 
"  so  baited  and  so  racked  with  the  fear  of  not  getting 
done."  His  friend,  in  joyful  surprise,  answers :  "  You 
will  see  yourself,  when  this  affair  is  blown  over,  what 
a  gain  it  has  been  to  you.  I  look  upon  it  as  something 
infinite." 

On  January  4,  1799,  Schiller  went  with  his  family 
to  Weimar  for  five  weeks.  Goethe  had  secured  him 
a  small  set  of  rooms  in  the  castle,  which  had  recently 
been  occupied  by  the  Stuttgart  court  architect,  Thouret. 
During  the  winter  months,  most  dangerous  to  Schiller, 
he  was  not  entirely  exempt  from  little  ailments.  Yet 
the  mingling  in  society  and  being  drawn  out  of  him- 
self were  so  beneficial,  he  could  live  so  much  more  of 
a  human  life  again,  that  in  those  five  weeks,  when  he 
attended  not  only  the  theatre,  but  the  court  and  the 
ballroom,  he  did  more  like  other  men  than  for  years 
past.  Most  of  his  time  was  spent  with  Goethe,  though 
visits  were  paid  to  Frau  von  Stein,  Frau  von  Kalb, 
Herder,  Wieland,  and  Voigt ;  even  with  Jean  Paul, 
now  settled  at  Weimar,  who  had  attached  himself  to 
Herder,  and  opposed  the  ideal  tendency  of  the  two 
poets,  he  associated  without  collision  whenever  he 
chanced  to   meet  him  in  society.     Fichte,   w^ho  had 


420  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

been  accused  of  atheism,  sent  him  his  "  Appeal  to  the 
Public."  Now  Schiller  himself  was  on  the  side  of 
liberty,  and  so  he  expressed  himself  to  the  duke  on 
this  matter  of  Ficlite  ;  but  the  latter  by  his  public 
"  Appeal "  had  placed  the  Weimar  government  in  an 
awkward  predicament.  The  "  Piccolomini,"  after  many 
reading-lessons  given  at  Goethe's  house,  followed  up 
by  partial,  and  then  by  full  rehearsals,  was  at  last  per- 
formed on  the  duchess's  birthday,  the  30th.  The 
Norwegian  natural  philosopher,  Stetiens,  aged  twenty- 
seven,  who  with  the  assistance  of  Count  Schimmel- 
mann  had  come  to  Jena  to  confer  with  Schelling, 
happened  to  get  a  seat  next  to  Schiller,  whose  personal 
acquaintance  he  now  made  for  the  first  time,  having 
been  kept  away  from  the  poet  by  the  hostile  Schlegel 
clique.  He  was  neither  inspired  by  the  acting  nor  by 
the  poetry,  and  must  have  cut  a  sorry  figure  by  the 
side  of  the  poet  enjoying  his  work.  As  a  whole  the 
performance  was  a  brilliant  success.  The  actors,  though 
there  was  not  a  genius  among  them,  did  their  very 
utmost,  and  Goethe  was  richly  rewarded  for  the  im- 
mense pains  he  had  bestowed  on  the  correct  utterance 
of  blank  verse,  a  thing  altogether  new  to  them.  Yet 
there  were  not  wanting  some  censorious  voices.  It 
was  complained  that  the  action  broke  off  just  when 
you  were  in  suspense  for  the  catastrophe ;  but  the 
majority  of  spectators,  surrendering  their  w^hole  soul 
to  the  impression,  felt  that  a  superior  spirit  breathed 
around  them.  A  most  beautiful  echo  of  the  per- 
formance reached  the  poet  in  a  letter  from  Frau  von 
Kalb,  who  gave  warm  utterance  to  the  impression 
made  upon  her  soul.  He  replied :  "  You  found  me 
[in  the  play] ;  I  am  glad  of  that,  for  I  spoke  out  my 
own  being  all  through."  The  duke  invited  both  the 
poets  to  dinner  on  February  1st;  the  chief  players, 
Grafif  and  Vohs,  received  gratuities  from  him  and  the 
duchess.     A  second  performance   on   the    2d    of   the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  421 

month  went  off  even  better  than  the  first.  Schiller 
thanked  Graff  by  letter  for  his  rendering  of  the  part 
of  Wallenstein,  in  which  it  would  be  hard  to  find  any 
one  to  follow  him.  On  the  4th  Schiller  dined  with 
the  duke  in  his  private  room.  He  returned  to  Jena 
two  days  after,  accompanied  by  Goethe ;  he  must  be 
quick  in  finishing  the  Third  Part,  for  it  was  to  be  acted 
in  April.  The  three  weeks  that  Goethe  spent  at  Jena 
again  yielded  evening  conversations  full  of  interest ; 
with  Schelhng  and  other  philosophers  Schiller  might 
play  I'hombre,  but  Goethe  cared  as  little  as  did  Korner 
for  such  idle  pastime.  "  When  you  hear  Schiller  and 
Goethe  talk,"  says  Lotte,  "  your  mind  is  full  of  ways 
of  using  your  days  and  your  life,  without  the  need  of 
idle  chat."  A  report  of  the  "  Piccolomini "  performance 
was  despatched  to  the  Allgemeine  Zcitung ;  then 
"  Wallenstein's  Death  "  and  the  "  Theory  of  Colours  " 
were  much  discussed.  Goethe  tried  to  keep  his  friend 
up  to  the  habit  acquired  at  Weimar  of  going  out,  and 
actually  got  him  to  dine  with  him  at  the  castle  several 
times. 

When  Schiitz's  wife  sent  round  a  subscription  hst 
for  establishing  a  private  theatre,  Schiller  declared 
that  the  sum  subscribed  ought  to  be  spent  on  the 
improvement  of  the  Weimar  theatre  :  amateur  perform- 
ances would  only  hinder  that,  without  bringing  any 
gain.  This  was  quite  in  accord  with  Goethe's  feeling : 
he  might  let  pass  little  actings  at  family  celebrations, 
but  he  had  no  patience  with  dilettantism,  even  in  the 
histrionic  art.  When  they  were  getting  up  theatricals 
for  his  friend  Loder's  birthday,  he  showed  himself 
quite  willing  to  assist  at  the  general  rehearsal,  that  he 
might  by  his  comments  raise  the  character  of  the 
performance.  On  this  occasion  Steffens,  in  Kotzebue's 
"  Play-actor  Against  His  Will,"  had  recited  two  high- 
flown  passages  out  of  Schiller's  early  dramas  in  the 
most  ranting   style,  to  turn  them    to  ridicule,  when 


422  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

Goethe  stepped  up  to  him  and  said :  "  Pray  choose 
some  other  passages ;  our  good  friend  Schiller  we 
would  rather  leave  out  of  the  play."  Wlien  the  theat- 
ricals at  Schiitz's  house  were  suppressed  soon  after,  by 
order  from  Weimar,  it  raised  a  feehng  against  Schiller, 
who  was  supposed  to  have  had  a  hand  in  it. 

During  this  period  he  received  a  letter  urgently 
praying  for  help  from  his  old  landlady  Hcilzel  at  Mann- 
heim, whom  the  bad  times  had  brought  into  bitter 
distress.  "  My  Hcilz's  hoary  head  appeals  to  your 
benevolent  heart,  and  so  do  I,"  she  wrote  at  the  end. 
He  immediately  sent  her  a  sympathising  letter,  and  an 
order  for  five  Carolines  on  Cotta,  who  was  to  forward 
the  same  sum  again  in  September.  "  Dear  friends," 
he  wrote,  "  in  any  future  trouble  turn  to  me ;  I  will 
help  with  heart  and  hand  to  the  utmost  of  my  power." 
The  good  woman's  gratitude  was  touchingly  expressed 
in  the  words,  "  I  weep  at  this  moment,  and  you  will 
weep  with  me  in  my  misery,  when  I  tell  you  that  with 
your  money  I  was  able  for  the  first  time  to  burn  a 
light  again  of  an  evening."  When  they  were  in  trouble 
again  three  years  after,  Schiller  obtained  for  her  son 
Adolf  a  place  as  scene-shifter  and  decorator. 

To  his  friend,  who  had  returned  to  Weimar,  he 
writes :  "  I  seem  to  be  looking  back  on  days  much 
more  distant  than  they  really  are ;  the  fact  is,  the 
theatre  world  and  my  seeing  more  of  society,  and  our 
unbroken  intercourse,  have  wrought  an  immense  change 
in  my  condition,  and  when  once  I  am  rid  of  this  huge 
'  Wallenstein '  business,  I  shall  feel  myself  quite  a  new 
being."  By  the  preparations  for  the  hero's  murder  hav- 
ing a  greater  amplitude  and  more  theatric  prominence 
given  them,  "  Wallenstein's  Death  "  soon  reached  the 
dimensions  of  the  indispensable  five  acts.  When  the 
first  two  were  sent  to  Goethe,  he  read  them  with  real 
interest :  one  might  rest  assured  of  their  effect  on  the 
stage.    Encouraged  by  this  good  word,  the  poet  pushed 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  423 

on  so  rapidly  that  on  March  17th  he  was  able  to  send 
the  last  three  acts  to  his  friend,  who  thought  the  new 
motives  in  them  very  tine  and  well-chosen ;  if  Schiller 
could  afterward  diminish  somewhat  the  bulk  of  the 
"  Piccolomini "  (it  had  once  included  even  the  first  two 
acts  of  the  "  Death  "),  the  two  parts  would  then  be  a 
priceless  boon  to  the  German  stage ;  the  last  part  had 
indeed  this  great  advantage,  that  it  dealt  merely  with 
the  heart  of  man,  the  historical  element  being  only  as 
a  thin  veil  over  the  purely  human. 

When  Goethe  came  to  Jena  again  on  the  21st,  Schil- 
ler had  already  fixed  on  a  new  dramatic  subject  and 
that  a  fictitious  one,  though  previously  he  had  forsworn 
such ;  it  was  his  old  plot  of  "  The  Hostile  Brothers." 
That  he  might  not  be  disturbed  in  its  execution,  he 
wished  this  time  in  place  of  the  "  Almanach  "  to  bring 
out  an  epic  poem,  "  The  Sisters  of  Lesbos,"  by  Frau  von 
Stein's  niece,  Amalie  von  Imhoff,  in  whose  endowment 
as  a  poet  and  painter  Schiller  took  a  warm  interest. 
Goethe  promised  an  elegy  by  way  of  introduction  ;  just 
then  he  was  at  work  on  his  "  Achilleis,"  with  the  most 
active  sympathy  on  Schiller's  part.  In  April  all  three 
parts  of  "  Wallenstein  "  were  to  be  given  in  quick  suc- 
cession. On  March  26th  the  first  two  acts  of  the 
"  Death  "  were  sent  to  the  theatre,  the  other  three  on 
the  29th.  Goethe  came  up  on  April  10th  with  Schil- 
ler, and  preliminary  rehearsals  took  up  the  next  few 
days.  Then  the  three  parts  were  played  all  in  one 
week,  on  the  Monday,  Wednesday,  and  Saturday  (April 
15th,  17th,  20th),  and  the  "Death"  given  again  the 
Monday  after.  The  effect  of  this  last  was  astonishing, 
even  the  least  susceptible  found  themselves  carried 
away ;  the  play  had  exceeded  all  expectations,  though 
ill-wishers  like  Caroline  Schlegel  found  the  magnificent 
poem  wanting  in  instinct,  and  its  conclusion  ineffect- 
ive, and  Herder  would  have  nothing  to  say  to  these 
grand  historical  dramas,  in  which  he  missed  the  purifi- 


424  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

cation  of  passion.  Him  Schiller  had  just  then  offended 
by  expressing  an  unfavourable  opinion  (so  he  was 
informed)  of  the  crusade  he  had  opened  in  tlie  Meta- 
Icritik  against  Kant.  The  performance  of  "  Wallen- 
stein's  Death "  was  the  first  complete  triumph  of  a 
dramatist  who  had  ripened  to  such  perfection  in  his 
art  that  he  had  in  truth,  despite  Dame  Lucifer's  cheap 
mockery,  made  for  liimself  an  immortal  name.  After 
the  splendid  success  of  this  historical  drama,  Schiller 
at  once  decided  to  drop  his  fictitious  theme ;  he  re- 
solved to  follow  up  the  "  Wallcnstein  "  with  a  "  Mary 
Stuart,"  a  subject  he  had  proposed  to  himself  many  years 
before.  On  the  25th  he  quitted  Weimar,  where  the 
ceaseless  chatter  about  his  play  had  at  last  bored  him, 
and  returned  to  Jena. 


CHAPTEE   III. 

APRIL,    1799,    TO    MARCH,    1804. 

Knowing  now  what  he  could  do,  on  ground  that  he 
had  conquered,  Schiller  strode  from  victory  to  victory. 
Four  great  dramas,  each  worked  on  a  different  pattern, 
placed  among  a  different  people,  in  a  different  century, 
and  all  illumined  by  his  lofty  spirit,  were  accomplished, 
though  not  without  intervals  between,  as  the  adapta- 
tion of  several  foreign  plays  had  to  serve  him  for  rest 
and  reinvigoration,  and  the  lyric  vein,  too,  yielded  now 
and  then  some  glorious  songs  and  ballads.  He  led  a 
more  sociable  life,  especially  after  his  removal  to 
Weimar,  which  brought  him  to  Goethe's  side  and 
into  immediate  connection  with  the  theatre ;  nay,  the 
court,  after  giving  him  a  title  of  nobility,  as  it  had  to 
Goethe  twenty  years  before,  drew  him  into  its  own 
circles  with  the  more  marked  distinction  as  the  other 
held  more  aloof.  His  outward  circumstances  improved, 
though  he  never  glutted  himself,  Hke  Kotzebue,  with 
pensions,  prebends,  and  rich  sinecures  ;  and  so  he  might 
hope  to  leave  his  increasing  family  not  without  means. 
But  what  rejoiced  him  more  than  all  was  the  fairest 
fruit  of  his  alliance  with  Goethe,  viz.,  the  full  and 
varied  development  of  his  vast  dramatic  powers,  not- 
withstanding all  the  illnesses  that  often  grievously 
hindered  him,  and  even  brought  him  to  death's  door. 

When  Goethe  came  to  Jena  on  May  1st  he  found 
Schiller  deep  in  the  historical  sources  of  his  "  Mary." 
This  time  they  not  only  spent  the  evenings  in  their 

425 


426  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

customary  converse,  but  as  Goethe  had  brought  a  car- 
riage with  him,  they  drove  out  together  nearly  every 
day.  Cotta  returning  from  Leipzig  called  on  the  2d ; 
he  handed  over  the  sum  promised  by  the  Berlin  theatre. 
Schiller  felt  so-  well  that  he  was  able  to  visit  the  Eng- 
lishman Mellish  in  his  summer  residence  at  Dornburg, 
having  made  his  acquaintance  when  at  Weimar,  On 
the  10th  he  moved  to  his  garden.  Here  the  essays 
for  the  "  Propylffia "  were  looked  and  talked  over  ; 
Schiller  was  willing  even  to  spend  a  few  months  him- 
self on  contributions  to  it,  though  the  completion  of 
"  Mary  Stuart "  would  be  delayed  by  it  until  the  end 
of  winter.  The  friends,  aiming  at  the  highest  perfec- 
tion in  art,  were  preparing  an  onslaught  on  the  chaos 
of  Dilettantism,  about  which  Goethe  was  drawing  up  a 
plan.  They  also  thouglit  of  publishing  a  "  German 
Theatre,"  an  adaptation  of  our  elder  dramas  to  the 
modern  stage.  With  Amalie  von  Imhoff  they  held 
personal  conferences  on  her  "  Sisters  of  Lesbos,"  and 
here  they  had  to  battle  with  the  narrow  wilfulness  of 
Dilettantism  :  the  offended  poetess  wished  to  withdraw 
her  work. 

When  Goethe  left  him  on  the  27th,  Schiller  felt 
quite  isolated ;  he  associated  indeed  with  the  philos- 
ophers Niethammer  and  Schelliug,  but  these  were 
getting  more  identified  with  the  Schlegel  group.  Kot- 
zebue,  who  had  been  roughly  handled  in  the  "  Xenien," 
and  had  retired  from  his  office  at  Vienna  with  a  hand- 
some sinecure  salary,  now  settled  at  Jena,  where  he 
occupied  a  garden  in  the  so-called  Paradise ;  Schiller 
declined  any  close  connection  with  him.  He  must 
have  been  a  shifty  fellow,  whom,  notwithstanding  the 
moral  contempt  he  had  drawn  upon  himself  by  first 
writing  and  then  disowning  his  grovelling  "  Doctor 
Bahrdt  of  the  Brazen  Brow,"  the  folks  at  Vienna  and 
Berlin  found  more  the  man  for  their  money,  whose 
shallow  but  clever  manufactures  deluged  the  theatres 


i 


I  that 

ha\Tj' 

the  1  .  .      , 

for   t'       •  ^      ,         ,1 "    W( 

Si.  .vas  willing  e  \ 

self  on  contributions  to  it,  the  col 

"Mary  Stuart"  would  be  dela^^ed  by  it  v 

of  winter.     The  fr:      ^     ■■        -  at  the  b- 

of 


,  who.  had  been  rou  ndled  in  the  "  Xenien," 

and  had  from  '  ma  with  a  ha 

Sf  '  now  "^  '  ' 

d( 

have  been  a  shifty  fellow,  whom,  standing  the 

'-  he  had  drawn  upon  himself  by  fir 

iL    vi     lilt;    :M,i.i'u     iv'i.'Vij      lju;     l'hi-..>    ii 

frmnrl    morn   th^.  Tnnn    f^">r    thri'*   ■; 
For/tiH/  of  ScJiilh') 

Photogravure  from  an  eiigraviny  liy  Massol 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  427 

at  home  and  abroad,  and  were  highly  paid  for  even  in 
England.  To  Schiller,  on  the  other  hand,  no  one  made 
an  offer,  and  he  was  driven  to  sohcit  through  Cotta  a 
bargain  with  Bell,  the  London  publisher.  The  Wallen- 
stein  plays  had  once  more  been  performed  at  Weimar. 
Kotzebue  having  begged  to  see  the  MS.,  Schiller  prom- 
ised it  him,  because  (as  he  wrote  to  Goethe)  this  favour 
cost  him  less  than  a  call  or  a  supper  would  have  done. 
Kotzebue  wanted  to  have  a  closer  look  at  it,  that  he 
might  himself  make  similar  attempts  at  historical  plays 
in  blank  verse. 

With  "  Mary  Stuart,"  begun  on  June  4th,  Schiller 
made  slow  advance  ;  to  open  the  subject  was  hard  work, 
and  he  was  hindered  by  many  visitors,  especially  by  a 
visit  of  a  week  from  his  sister  and  brother-in-law 
Eeinwald.  The  latter,  harassed  and  pinched  in  cir- 
cumstances, was  now  still  more  bowed  down  by  his 
hypochrondriac  infirmity ;  he  offered  him  few,  and 
those  not  the  pleasantest,  points  of  contact,  being  a 
type  of  the  ordinary  "  imperfectible,  narrow  way  of 
thinking,"  which  might  drive  one  to  despair,  if  one 
expected  anything  of  it.  The  more  did  Schiller  enjoy 
the  fond  affection  of  his  sister,  who  had  so  much  to 
bear  from  Eeinwald,  and  who  was  the  passionately 
devoted  companion  of  his  early  youth.  On  the  30th 
he  went  on  with  her  to  Weimar,  where  during  the 
presence  of  their  Prussian  Majesties  he  stayed  at 
Goethe's.  The  court  being  pressed  for  room,  the  poet 
had  had  to  take  the  crown  prince  into  his  house,  and 
could  only  offer  his  friend  very  makeshift  accommoda- 
tion. The  king  had  purposely  abstained  from  seeing 
"  Wallenstein's  Death  "  acted  at  Berlin  that  he  might 
drink  it  in  first  at  the  f ountainhead.  Here  it  was  given 
with  great  applause  on  July  2d.  The  author  had  to 
pay  his  respects  to  the  royal  pair ;  he  found  Queen 
Louisa  "  very  kindly,  and  of  an  extremely  obliging 
deportment."     All  this  time  Goethe  was  in  such  request 


428  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

that  Schiller  saw  but  little  of  him.  Not  to  disturb  his 
friend's  enjoyment  of  these  days  of  triumph,  he  with- 
held from  him  the  sorry  news  he  had  just  received  from 
Cotta,  that,  of  the  "  Propylsea,"  for  which  both  poets 
had  counted  on  a  marked  success,  barely  450  copies 
had  gone  off.  When  Schiller  on  returning  home  learnt 
tlie  fact  by  a  letter  from  Cotta,  he  felt  angered  at  the 
shabby  conduct  of  the  pubhc,  in  valuing  so  slightly  a 
work  in  which  an  artistic  genius  of  the  highest  order 
was  giving  out  the  rich  results  of  his  lifelong  study. 
If  the  gracious  Majesties  honoured  the  poet  with  no 
sensible  token  of  their  favour,  he  was  the  more  pleased 
at  the  duchess  presenting  him  with  an  elegant  silver 
coffee-service.  The  ducal  theatre  paid  nothing  for 
Schiller's  dramas ;  on  the  other  hand,  he  insisted,  with 
Goethe's  hearty  approval,  on  receiving  a  proportionate 
sum  out  of  the  Weimar  Company's  performances  in 
other  places. 

Notwithstanding  the  great  heat  of  July,  Schiller 
finished  the  first  act  of  his  "  Mary  "  on  the  24th,  and 
began  the  second  the  next  day.  To  his  sorrow,  as 
Goethe  was  detained  at  Weimar,  he  missed  his  best 
external  stimulus.  He  wrote  to  him,  "  With  the  phi- 
losophers, you  know,  one  can  only  play  at  cards."  It 
was  at  this  tin)e  that  Tieck  came  to  Jena  for  a  fort- 
night, where  he  made  friends  with  Hardenberg,  now 
entirely  estranged  from  Schiller.  The  latter,  while  at 
Leipzig,  had  become  a  passionate  admirer  of  Friedrich 
Schlegel,  to  whom  he  assigned  a  most  distinguished 
role,  that  of  an  ultimate  reconciler  of  all  philosophies, 
and  Caroline  did  what  lay  in  her  power  to  lower  Schiller 
in  his  estimation.  Goethe,  whom  he  considered  the 
most  remarkable  physicist  of  the  age,  also  passed  with 
him  for  the  only  poet.  This  Hardenberg,  who  wished 
to  see  all  the  sciences  poetised,  had  not  a  point  left  of 
mental  sympathy  with  Schiller,  though  personally  he 
wished  him  well  all  the  while,  and  kept  up  a  friendly 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  429 

intercourse  with  him  at  Jena.  With  Tieck,  the  true 
poet  of  the  Eomautic,  Schiller  was  not  ill-pleased ;  his 
style,  if  not  remarkable  for  strength,  was  refined, 
thoughtful,  suggestive,  and  there  was  nothing  of  the 
flippant  in  him.  Schiller  drew  his  attention  to  Spanish 
literature,  which  he  thought  likely  to  suit  him  with 
his  turn  for  the  fantastic  and  romantic.  But  Dame 
Lucifer  set  him  against  Schiller  the  more  easily  as  his 
brother-in-law  Eeichardt  was  still  his  inveterate  enemy. 
She  also  got  hold  of  Schelling  and  Niethammer,  and 
even  Paulus  and  his  wife  donned  her  livery.  Thus  all 
the  Suabians  in  Jena  fell  away  from  Schiller.  Happily 
his  health  was  now  stronger,  and  he  was  comforted  by 
the  assurance  that  he  had  not  mistaken  his  vocation. 
It  is  affecting  to  read  the  resolution  he  confided  to 
Kdrner,  that  for  the  "  next  six  years  "  he  would  con- 
fine himself  to  the  drama.  Alas  !  before  the  six  years 
had  run  their  course  he  was  gone.  He  had  now  de- 
termined for  the  future  to  hve  the  whole  winter  at 
Weimar ;  to  study  the  stage  with  his  own  eyes  made 
work  much  easier  for  him,  and  lent  the  imagination  a 
suitable  stimulus  from  without. 

Goethe,  unable  to  leave  Weimar,  had  retired  to  his 
garden-house,  and  sent  his  family  to  Jena.  "  Pray 
make  August  welcome  at  your  house  now  and  then," 
he  asks  of  Schiller.  It  is  probably  not  accidental  that 
Schiller  left  this  unanswered ;  no  doubt  Lotte  was 
afraid  the  boy  would  bring  the  mother  upon  them,  too  ; 
and  she  was  her  abomination.  When  informed  by 
Schiller  that  he  is  studying  ways  and  means  for  spend- 
ing the  winter  months  at  Weimar,  because  he  feels 
more  strongly  every  day  his  need  of  attendances  at 
the  theatre,  Goethe  replies :  "  We  will  gladly  do  our 
best  to  further  it."  SchiUer  mentioned  his  determina- 
tion to  petition  the  duke  for  that  increase  of  salary 
of  which  hopes  had  been  held  out  to  him  five  years 
before,  yet  the  matter  would  be  much  simplified,  no 


43°  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

doubt,  if  he  could  make  his  presence  useful  to  the 
theatre.  Goethe  would  williugly  on  the  part  of  the 
theatre  have  aided  his  friend  to  live  at  Weimar,  had 
he  come  over  at  the  commencement  of  the  acting  sea- 
son, but  that  was  hindered  by  Lotte's  approaching 
confinement.  He  heard,  however,  that  Frau  von 
Kalb's  apartments  would  be  empty,  and  at  once  sent 
Schiller  word ;  to  be  sure,  the  lodgings  would  only  let 
by  the  year,  but  then  the  theatre  had  every  reason  to 
make  the  remove  easy  to  him.  Otherwise,  he  offered 
him  for  himself  the  same  rooms  at  the  castle  that  he 
had  occupied  in  January,  as  he  had  not  the  space  in 
his  own  house  to  make  a  convenient  winter  residence. 
But  Schiller  made  up  his  mind  to  rent  Frau  von  Kalb's 
apartments  for  a  year.  Goethe  then  persuaded  him  to 
take  them  on  a  lease  of  several  years,  and  himself  made 
the  agreement  for  him  with  the  owner,  Miiller  the  wig- 
maker.  It  was  the  first  floor,  well  known  to  Lotte,  of 
the  house  A  71  in  the  Windischengasse,  and  the  rent 
came  to  122  thalers.  Frau  von  Kalb  expressed  her 
willingness  to  leave  some  of  her  furniture  in  the 
rooms. 

Goethe,  who  directed  the  printing  of  the  "  Almauach," 
required  some  more  poems  for  it,  as  the  epic  of  the 
"  Lesbian  Sisters "  alone  would  not  furnish  sufficient 
matter.  Through  Meyer's  intervention  he  obtained 
a  good  number  of  pieces  from  Herder;  he  himself 
could  contribute  nothing.  On  the  26th,  Schiller,  hav- 
ing finished  the  second  act  of  "Mary  Stuart,"  wished 
to  try  something  lyrical,  but  succeeded  so  ill,  that  he 
betook  himself  the  very  next  day  to  the  third  act,  in 
which  he  made  use  of  Ivric  metres.  The  "  Almanach," 
which  mixed  him  up  with  twenty  or  thirty  metre- 
mongers,  was  become  so  hateful  to  him  that  he  wanted 
to  throw  it  up  for  good.  Yet  on  September  3d,  having 
got  to  the  scene  in  "  Mary  "  between  the  two  queens, 
he  broke  off;  he  wished,  if  possible,  to  produce  some- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  43^ 

thing  in  the  lyric  manner  again.  On  the  4th  he  set 
out  with  his  family  for  Ruclolstadt,  of  which  he  had 
seen  nothing  for  seven  years,  intending  to  recreate  him- 
self thoroughly  there,  Lotte,  too,  was  suffering  from 
spasms,  and  needed  rest.  Here  they  led,  as  before,  a 
life  of  cheerful  ease,  in  the  circle  of  their  kindred  and 
friends.  He  had  already  laid  before  the  duke  his 
request  that  he  would  lessen  the  increase  of  expense 
which  his  removal  to  Weimar  and  a  double  establish- 
ment had  occasioned,  by  a  rise  in  his  salary.  He  re- 
minded him  of  the  gracious  advice  given  by  himself  at 
the  beginning  of  the  year,  to  attend  the  theatre  more 
frequently.  He  desired  to  draw  nearer  to  his  gracious 
master  and  their  S.  H.  the  duchesses,  and,  by  zealously 
striving  for  his  approval,  to  perfect  himself  yet  further 
in  his  art,  and  thereby  possibly  contribute  some  little 
to  the  duke's  own  amusement.  Coming  up  to  Weimar 
on  the  13th,  he  learned  that  the  duke  had  gi-anted  him 
an  additional  two  hundred  dollars,  to  commence  with 
Michaelmas  ;  further,  he  had  four  loads  of  firewood 
and  other  small  privileges  placed  in  prospect. 

On  the  15th  he  returned  to  Jena,  whither  Goethe 
followed  him  the  very  next  day,  intending  there  to 
execute  a  translation  of  Voltaire's  "  Mahomet "  by  de- 
sire of  the  duke,  and  to  revise  with  Wilhelm  Schlegel 
the  prosody  of  his  poems  in  hexameters  and  elegiacs, 
for  his  new  "  Collection,"  then  coming  out.  Friedrich 
also  had  come  home.  Goethe  often  went  to  their 
house,  but,  as  a  rule,  Wilhelm  called  on  him  at  the 
castle,  and  walked  out  with  him  for  several  hours. 
Goethe's  clinging  to  the  Schlegels  was  not  at  all  to 
Schiller's  taste ;  they  wanted  right  feehng  and  heart, 
the  pair  of  them,  and  their  reckless  onslaught  even  on 
Humboldt,  who  had  always  kept  on  good  terms  with 
them,  showed  they  were  "  rotten  to  the  core."  How 
hostile  they  were  to  himself,  he  knew  but  too  well. 
But  Goethe  valued  Wilhelm's  vast  knowledge,  his  cul- 


432  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

tivated  taste,  and  particularly  his  talent  for  language 
and  versification,  as  well  as  Friedrich's  pliilosophic 
mind,  which  Schiller  never  disputed ;  to  their  failiugs 
he  was  far  from  being  bhnd.  He  had  written  to  Schiller 
a  month  before :  "  It  is  a  pity  that  both  the  brothers 
lack  a  certain  sohd  core  to  give  them  steadfastness  and 
solidity.  Then  again,  in  personal  relationship  you  can't 
be  sure  at  all  of  getting  off  without  a  drubbing  from 
them  at  some  time  or  other.  Yet  I  will  more  readily 
forgive  them  a  hard  rap,  than  the  infamous  manner  of 
the  masters  in  journalism."  Did  not  they  stand  up  for 
the  principles  of  the  new  school  of  philosophy  and  art, 
though  they  were  so  unjust  to  Schiller  as  to  deny  him 
any  true  poetic  talent  ?  Goethe's  close  alliance  with 
Schiller  showed  the  brothers  how  highly  he  prized 
him ;  neither  of  them  was  bold  enough  to  utter  a 
word  against  him  in  his  presence,  or  even  to  print 
one.  He  just  used  them  for  his  own  ends,  and  avoided 
anything  that  might  have  changed  his  devoted  ad- 
mirers into  declared  enemies,  of  whom  he  had  enough 
already. 

Goethe's  evenings  were  given  up  almost  to  Schiller 
alone,  who  was  then  busy  with  his  great  "  Song  of  the 
Bell "  and  the  "  Collection  "  of  his  poems.  That  glori- 
ous Song,  with  which  the  "  Almanach  "  was  to  end,  he 
sent  to  the  press  on  September  30th.  He  went  back 
at  once  to  "  Mary,"  besides  which  he  was  meditating 
two  other  dramatic  fables,  the  pretender  Warbeck  and 
his  old  "  Knights  of  Malta,"  of  which  he  meant  to  sub- 
mit the  outline  to  the  duke.  When  he  moved  into  the 
town  on  October  5th,  he  was  looking  forward  with 
intense  anxiety  to  his  wife's  confinement,  which  took 
place  with  difficulty  but  safely  about  eleven  o'clock  on 
the  night  of  the  11th.  He  was  excessively  overjoyed 
at  Lotte's  safety  and  the  birth  of  a  strong  and  healthy 
daughter.  Baptised  on  the  morning  of  the  15th,  she 
received   the  names  of   Caroline  Henriette   Luise,  of 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  433 

which  only  the  last  could  have  been  taken  from  one 
of  the  three  sponsors,  Fran  von  Lengenfeld  ;  the  parish 
register  mentions  as  such  J.  W.  Goethe,  who  had  left 
on  the  13th,  Lotte's  mother,  and  her  Rudolstadt  friend, 
Friederike  von  Gleichen.  The  last  two  names  were 
given  to  Schiller's  second  daughter  as  well.  Lotte's 
slow  recovery  made  Schiller  uneasy ;  and  he  could  not 
escape  many  domestic  cares,  though  the  presence  of  his 
mother-in-law  was  a  great  comfort.  During  this  time 
he  had  his  poems  and  a  second  part  of  his  prose  writ- 
ings copied  for  the  press,  offered  the  publisher  a  new, 
improved,  and  enlarged  edition  of  his  "  Eevolt  of  the 
Netherlands,"  and  saw  to  the  forwarding  of  his  "  Wal- 
lenstein "  to  the  English  publisher.  Bell,  who  agreed 
to  pay  X60  for  the  right  of  translation.  On  the  22d 
he  took  up  the  plot  of  his  "  Knights  "  again.  But  the 
very  next  night  Lotte  was  attacked  by  a  nervous  fever, 
attended  with  violent  dehrium.  She  would  have  no 
one  about  her  but  himself,  her  own  mother,  and  the 
landlady,  and  Scliiller  was  in  perpetual  excitement. 
He  sat  up  the  second  night  with  the  sufferer,  whose 
ravings  were  anguishing  to  him.  It  was  not  till  the 
30th  that  the  physician  pronounced  her  out  of  danger, 
though  even  then  she  had  not  recovered  the  possession 
of  her  senses.  At  length,  on  November  5th,  an  im- 
provement set  in,  and  Schiller  was  able  the  next  day 
for  his  recreation  to  drive  over  to  Weimar  for  a  few 
hours  with  Karl,  and  this  time  he  actually  left  the  boy 
behind  at  Goethe's  house.  Unhappily  the  convales- 
cence did  not  continue.  Goethe  came  on  the  9th  to 
stay.  It  was  twelve  days  more  before  Lotte  was  so 
far  restored  that  she  was  able  to  write  a  letter.  With 
a  lightened  heart  Schiller  now  gave  himself  up  to 
Goethe's  society,  who  had  finished  his  "  Mahomet " 
and  was  chiefly  occupied  with  his  "  Theory  of  Colours." 
On  December  3d  he  and  his  went  from  Jena.  Fried- 
rich  Schlegel  had  by  this  time  brought  in  his  Dorothea 


434  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Veit ;  Tieck  and  his  family  were  settled  at  Jena ;  and 
Hardenberg  often  came  over. 

At  Weimar,  Lotte  with  Karl  and  little  Caroline  took 
up  her  temporary  abode  at  Frau  von  Stein's;  while 
Scliiller,  having  Ernst  witli  him,  managed  with  the 
help  of  his  sister-in-law  the  fitting  up  of  his  new  resi- 
dence, and  also  looked  after  many  delayed  letters  and 
parcels.  He  waited  on  the  duke,  and  was  kindly 
received.  We  here  give  the  facsimile  of  a  note  writ- 
ten by  Schiller  to  Lotte  on  the  7th.  The  "  Schwenkin  " 
was  a  faithful  servant  of  Dame  Wolzogen  (the  "  Frau  "), 
viz.  Wilhelmiue  Schwenke,  who  afterward  nursed  Schil- 
ler in  his  last  hours ;  the  "  Oper,"  Salieri's  "  Ciphered 
Casket."  On  the  8th  Goethe  came  home  to  Weimar, 
and  now  the  closest  communion  recommenced  between 
them.  Scliiller  was  able  to  take  part  in  society,  though 
he  suffered  once  from  the  spasms  again.  On  Monday, 
the  16th,  Lotte  took  possession  of  her  new  and  well- 
appointed  home.  The  two  boys  were  in  high  spirits 
and  health,  and  the  baby  daughter,  with  her  pleasing, 
delicate  features,  and  a  look  full  of  expression  that 
reminded  Lotte  of  the  Princess  of  Kudolstadt,  was  a 
source  of  the  liveliest  pleasure  to  them  all.  The  rooms 
below  were  inhabited  by  Frau  von  Stein's  brother. 
Privy  Councillor  von  Schardt,  who,  with  his  gi-aceful, 
refined,  poetically  gifted  wife,  proved  most  kind  and 
obhging.  Frau  von  Stein  and  the  brother  and  sister- 
in-law  offered  the  friendliest  society;  then  the  court 
and  many  social  circles  were  open  to  them  at  Weimar. 
On  the  evening  of  the  17th  Schiller  was  at  Goethe's 
house,  and  heard  his  translation  of  "  Mahomet "  read 
before  the  duke  and  duchess.  Ten  days  after  both 
poets  dined  with  the  duke.  They  spent  the  last  even- 
ing of  the  year  in  the  most  familiar  friendship.  Schil- 
ler had  by  this  time  finished  the  third  act  of  his  "  Mary," 
and  was  now  to  have  a  share  in  the  management  of 
the  theatre,  the  improvement  of  which  lay  so  near  to 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  435 

Goethe's  heart ;  and  this  brought  him  into  closer  con- 
tact with  the  players.  To  drive  Kotzebue  entirely  off 
the  boards  was  more  than  they  could  do,  as  he  was 
a  favourite  with  the  dowager-duchess  ;  they  had  to  give 
his  "  Gustavus  Vasa,"  written  in  blank  verse  in  imitation 
of  Schiller,  and  overfull  of  action. 

The  year  1800  opened  so  favourably,  that  Schiller 
could  not  only  frequent  the  theatre  but  the  club,  and 
take  Lotte  to  the  ball.  Most  evenings  he  was  with 
Goethe,  who  persuaded  him  to  make  a  prologue  for  the 
performance  of  his  "  Mahomet,"  and  an  adaptation  of 
"  Macbeth  ; "  in  the  meantime  his  own  play  stood  still. 
After  the  rehearsals  of  "  Mahomet,"  he  gave  the  actors 
an  entertainment.  Everything  was  going  on  well ;  the 
printing  of  "  Wallenstein "  had  just  begun,  when  on 
February  16th  he  was  seized  with  a  nervous  fever 
which  fell  upon  his  chest.  A  young  physician,  Doctor 
Harbaur,  who  had  formed  his  friendship  while  at  Jena, 
offered  to  attend  him,  and  devoted  himself  to  him  with 
self-denying  love.  The  poet's  friends  had  given  him 
up,  when  the  stimulating  remedies  apphed  just  saved 
his  life.  In  ten  days  the  fever  had  given  way,  but  he 
still  suffered  from  cough  and  a  stitch  in  the  side,  and 
felt  extremely  exhausted.  All  Weimar  showed  the 
most  anxious  sympathy  ;  and  Goethe  and  Meyer  proved 
most  faithful  friends,  whose  visits  were  as  a  cordial  to 
the  worn-out  sufferer.  On  March  23d  Schiller  was 
able  to  call  on  Goethe,  who  was  then  himself  ill,  and 
sorely  longing  for  him.  The  meeting  was  a  delightful 
one  for  each.  Though  the  air  and  the  climbing  of  stairs, 
especially  at  his  own  house,  affected  Schiller  a  good 
deal,  afflicted  as  he  still  was  with  the  cough,  yet  he 
was  able  to  repeat  the  visit,  and  soon  even  to  venture 
to  the  theatre  again.  The  mild  spring  air  completed 
his  recovery.  And  Lotte  was  in  good  spirits,  too ;  she 
had  soon  adapted  herself  to  the  social  life  of  Weimar. 
As  she  now  had  to  spend  more  on  her  attire,  the  second 


436  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

housemaid  was  replaced  by  a  more  showy  lady's  maid. 
Schiller  had  quite  given  up  the  intention  of  passing 
the  summer  at  Jena ;  his  garden  there  was  put  up  to 
let,  and  at  the  end  of  March  was  taken  by  Professor 
Hufeland.  While  attending  to  the  printing  of  "  Wal- 
lenstein  "  and  of  the  prose  works,  he  finished  translating 
"  Macbeth,"  and  also  took  an  active  part  in  revising 
Goethe's  Collection  of  Poems.  With  his  health  he  also 
recovered  all  his  vigour  of  mind,  and  was  meditating 
a  journey  to  Berlin.  He  felt  in  such  happy  tune  for 
dramatic  composition  that  he  offered  the  pubhsher 
Unger,  of  Berlin,  a  drama  of  his  in  lieu  of  the  "  The- 
ater Kalendar  "  he  had  proposed  before.  He  could  now 
put  up  with  Goethe's  unwillingness  to  break  with  the 
Schlegels ;  their  ill-will  toward  him  did  not  trouble 
him,  though  it  was  carried  to  such  a  pitch  of  infatua- 
tion, that  Caroline  Schlegel  had  the  mad  arrogance  to 
write  to  her  little  spoiled  daughter  about  Schiller's 
imperishable  "  Song  of  the  Bell,"  saying  that  at  dinner 
they  nearly  fell  ofl'  their  chairs  with  laughing  at  it : 
it  was  "  d  la  Voss,  d  la  Tieck,  4  la  Diable."  Schelliug 
called  on  Schiller  before  leaving  for  Bamberg,  to  com- 
mend himself  to  his  continued  friendship,  and  handed 
to  him  his  "  System  of  Transcendental  Idealism."  He 
wrote  soon  after  and  asked  what  they  thought  at 
Weimar  of  his  too  fierce  attack  on  the  AUgcmeiiu 
Literatur  Zeitung,  for  which  that  journal  threatened 
him  with  an  action.  Schiller  closed  his  reply  with 
the  wish :  "  As  you  yourself  in  your  system  weave  so 
close  a  bond  between  poet  and  philosopher,  let  the 
same  inseparably  bind  our  friendship."  Unfortunately 
the  philosopher,  tarred  on  by  Caroline,  had  left  many 
weak  points  in  his  argument,  which  were  exposed  in 
Schiitz's  reply.  Schelling,  like  all  the  Eomanticists, 
was  unjust  to  Schiller  as  a  poet ;  as  a  philosopher  he 
valued  him  more  highly. 

After  finishing  "Macbeth,"   Schiller  returned  with 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  437 

all  his  soul  to  "  Mary  Stuart ; "  at  the  same  time  he 
took  charge  of  the  theatre,  both  during  Goethe's  illness, 
and  still  more  when  at  the  end  of  April  he  accom- 
panied the  duke  to  Leipzig  Fair.  He  bestowed  par- 
ticular pains  on  the  rehearsals  of  "  Macbeth,"  which 
he  had  already  offered  to  the  Berlia  and  Frankfort 
theatres,  though  in  the  first  case  without  success. 
Free  movement  in  the  fresh  air  during  his  walks 
with  Meyer,  and  the  pleasure  he  took  in  his  work, 
had  alike  a  good  effect  on  his  health,  for  he  never  felt 
so  well  as  when  he  lived  wholly  in  his  poetry.  Cotta, 
in  passing  through  with  his  wife,  stayed  at  Weimar  on 
the  3d  and  4th  of  May.  The  remembrance  of  the 
goodness  and  kindness  they  had  met  with  in  Schiller's 
household  made  them  both  wish  they  could  spend 
their  lives  near  these  friends.  Schiller  now  felt  will- 
ing to  continue  the  "Almanach."  Cotta  took  down 
a  copy  of  his  "Words  of  Illusion,"  and  there  was 
again  talk  of  the  "Knights."  On  the  11th  Schiller 
had  the  players  at  his  house  from  five  o'clock  until 
eleven  to  read  the  first  four  acts  of  his  "  Mary." 
"  Macbeth  "  was  played  for  the  first  time  on  the  14th 
and  with  great  applause.  The  next  day  Schiller,  with 
his  man  Eudolf,  retired  to  the  ducal  castle  at  Etters- 
burg,  a  league  and  a  half  from  Weimar,  to  finish  his 
fifth  act ;  for  the  bustle  of  the  street  and  the  children's 
noise  disturbed  him. 

Goethe  was  home  from  his  journey  on  the  16th, 
but  could  not  go  to  see  him,  and  Meyer  went  instead ; 
the  duke  himself  paid  him  a  visit,  being  now  as  kindly 
disposed  toward  him,  as  the  duchess  was  on  intimate 
terms  with  Lotte.  The  reading  rehearsals  of  his  new 
drama  brought  him  up  to  Weimar  on  the  23d,  where 
he  received  Cotta  on  his  way  through  from  Leipzig. 
On  the  evening  of  the  25th  he  returned  to  Ettersburg. 
Four  days  later  the  players  who  were  to  act  Mary, 
Mortimer,   Burleigh,   and    Melvil   came   down   for   a 


438  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

rehearsal,  but  there  was  more  chatting  than  rehearsing 
done.  Then  Schiller,  beginning  after  all  to  find  his 
solitude  tedious,  left  Ettersburg  on  June  2d.  In 
another  week  the  fifth  act  of  "  Mary  "  was  complete, 
and  its  performance  was  being  got  up  with  the  greatest 
care.  The  duke  having  heard  through  the  actress 
Jagemann  that  in  the  last  act  Mary  was  to  take  the 
Sacrament,  he  urged  Goethe  to  prevent  its  being  done. 
Of  course  Schiller  had  no  choice  but  to  submit  to  the 
express  will  of  the  sovereign,  however  much  the  play 
might  suffer  by  the  omission.  The  drama  was  given 
with  great  effect  on  the  14th,  and  repeated  two  days 
after.  Besides  the  excellence  of  individual  renderings, 
the  performance  was  marked  by  that  perfect  balance 
and  harmony  of  the  whole  to  which  Goethe  had 
trained  his  company.  Schiller's  confidence  in  his 
dramatic  power  was  much  strengthened  by  the  great 
success  of  this  play,  whose  completion  had  been  kept 
back  by  two  serious  illnesses.  He  writes  to  Korner: 
"  I  am  beginning  at  last  to  get  a  control  over  the  dra- 
matic organ,  and  to  understand  my  trade."  He  had 
already  set  his  heart  on  a  new  subject,  the  treatment 
of  which  was  to  form  a  perfect  contrast  to  that  of 
"  Mary,"  viz.  the  visionary  maid  who  wrested  France 
from  England's  grasp.  "  Every  subject  wants  a  shape 
of  its  own,"  says  he  to  Korner,  "  and  Art  consists  in 
finding  the  fittest.  The  idea  of  a  tragedy  should  be 
always  mobile  and  in  the  state  of  getting-to-be,  and 
only  virtualiter  be  embodied  in  the  one  hundred  or 
one  thousand  possible  forms."  But  his  first  business 
was  to  furnish  copies  of  "  Mary "  to  the  Berlin  and 
Leipzig  theatres. 

The  whole  of  "  Wallenstein  "  was  now  in  print.  The 
impression  was  of  four  thousand  copies  in  three  differ- 
ent editions,  respectively  on  vellum,  wi'iting,  and  print- 
ing paper.  His  plan  of  making  the  theatres  bid  for 
the  use  of  the  MS.  had  broken  down  miserably  ;  Berlin 


THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER  439 

alone  paid  anything ;  at  Vienna  the  performance  was 
prohibited  by  the  censorship ;  at  Stuttgart,  where  his 
earher  plays  were  then  under  interdict,  they  would  not 
venture  on  "  Wallenstein  "  fur  fear  of  the  Imperialists ; 
Frankfort  and  Magdeburg  were  frightened  at  the  price. 
In  England  the  poet  fared  worst  of  all.  The  London 
publisher,  after  selling  the  MS.  to  another,  who  had  it 
translated  by  Coleridge,  refused  payment ;  it  was  only 
obtained  in  the  course  of  the  next  two  years  in  four 
instalments.  A  French  translation,  which  Count  Nar- 
bonne  wished  to  undertake  while  living  at  Eisenach, 
never  appeared ;  the  four  or  five  hundred  livres  that 
Schiller  asked  for  the  MS.  seem  to  have  stood  in  the 
way. 

A  source  of  the  purest  invigoration  of  mind  and 
heart  to  the  poet  was  his  continued  intimacy  with 
Goethe,  whose  boy,  too,  was  little  Karl's  most  constant 
playmate.  He  now  found  it  impossible  to  produce  the 
"  Almanach ''  promised  to  Cotta,  for  his  whole  soul 
impelled  him  to  drama.  By  July  1st  he  was  getting 
more  into  his  subject,  of  which  he  said  nothing  even 
to  Goethe.  On  the  4th  he  informs  his  wife,  who  had 
then  been  a  week  at  Eudolstadt,  that  the  plot  of 
his  new  tragedy  would  soon  be  ready.  And  during 
Goethe's  absence,  from  July  2 2d  until  August  4th,  he 
was  incessantly  at  his  drama,  carefully  getting  up  the 
authorities,  though  at  the  same  time  he  had  "  War- 
beck  "  floating  in  his  mind  too.  "  A  demon  pursues 
me,"  he  declares  on  July  28th,  "  till  I  can  see  the  two 
pieces  I  have  next  my  mind  fairly  written  out."  If 
he  got  his  "  Mary  "  done  in  seven  months  and  a  half, 
he  thinks  that  now,  with  increased  practice  and  gi-eater 
certainty  in  execution,  he  can  turn  out  a  play  in  six 
months.  "At  that  rate  I  hope  to  make  up  for  past 
delay,  and,  if  I  live  to  be  fifty,  to  earn  a  place  yet 
among  prolific  writers  for  the  stage."  Alas !  the 
spasms   were   already   tormenting  him  again,  and  at 


440  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Goethe's  return  the  ground-plan  of  the  "Maid  of 
Orleans"  was  still  unfinished.  Though  he  went  on 
August  14th  to  the  neighbouring  village  of  Oberwei- 
niar,  he  could  not  get  on  much  in  the  oppressive  heat, 
and  soon  returned  to  town  ;  but  even  there  he  made 
no  material  progress  with  the  play.  The  first  volume 
of  his  "  Poems,"  which,  together  with  a  few  of  the 
earlier  period,  contained  most  of  those  that  had  ap- 
peared since  1795,  newly  revised,  and  some  consider- 
ably shortened,  left  the  press  about  this  time.  Among 
many  other  things  he  thought  of  working  up  a  Chinese 
novel  from  an  old  translation. 

It  was  only  when  Goethe  retired  to  Jena  on  Sep- 
tember 3d,  to  get  a  month's  quiet  work,  that  Schiller 
actually  commenced  his  "  Jungfrau,"  but  he  could  not 
get  well  into  it,  even  then.  "  With  so  poor  a  stock  of 
outward  scenes  and  experiences  to  fall  back  upon,"  says 
he,  w^riting  to  Goethe,  "  each  work  costs  m"e  a  method 
of  its  own  and  nuich  waste  of  time  to  put  life  into 
the  subject.  And  my  present  subject  is  none  of  the 
easiest,  nor  one  that  comes  natural  to  me."  It  was 
always,  of  course,  a  great  trouble  to  him  to  transport 
himself  into  a  past  time,  a  strange  land,  and  among 
strange  people.  At  Goethe's  request  he  associated 
himself  with  Meyer  in  adjudicating  the  prizes  at  the 
Weimar  Art  Exhibition,  but  he  thought  it  advisable 
to  express  his  opinion  only  in  a  letter  to  the  editor  of 
the  "Propylaea."  He  went  with  Meyer  on  the  21st 
to  see  Goethe,  who  read  to  him  the  beginning  of  his 
"  Helena,"  written  in  trimeter.  The  unusual  form  of 
verse  so  attracted  Schiller  that  he  wanted  to  study 
it  more  minutely,  and  thought  he  would  use  it  in  a 
scene  of  his  play  which  was  to  have  a  tinge  of  the 
antique.  The  Weimar  Company,  who  returned  soon 
after  from  an  acting  tour,  had  had  great  success  with 
his  "  Mary,"  at  Lauchstadt  and  Paidolstadt ;  it  brought 
him  in  150  thalers  from  the  theatre.     He  was  still 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  441 

more  pleased  at  the  rapid  sale  of  "  Wallenstein."  As 
early  as  September  Cotta  had  to  prepare  a  new  edition, 
though  to  prevent  pirating  the  price  was  lowered.  An 
edition  of  all  his  dramatic  works,  which  the  pubhsher 
had  asked  for,  he  would  not  begin  before  Easter,  1802. 
On  the  other  hand,  he  urged  Cotta  to  print  an  Enghsh 
version  of  "  Mary  "  by  his  friend  Melhsh.  Unfortu- 
nately, in  England  they  looked  with  little  favour  on 
a  translation  issued  by  a  German  publisher  in  his  own 
country,  and  made  by  an  Englishman  who  lived  in 
Germany ;  and  the  efforts  made  to  suppress  the  sale 
proved  but  too  effectual. 

Wlien  Goethe  returned  to  Weimar  on  October  4th, 
the  theatre  made  extraordinary  demands  on  the  atten- 
tion of  the  two  poets.  In  vain  did  Cotta  repeatedly 
ask  for  the  new  "  Almanach  ; "  Scliiller  had  to  give  all 
his  strength  to  his  tragedy,  which  even  then  he  dared 
not  hope  to  finish  before  the  end  of  winter.  He  offered 
it  to  linger,  however,  on  November  6th,  for  an  Annual, 
though  suppressing  its  name,  at  the  price  of  one  hun- 
dred Carolines,  being  bound  thereto  by  a  previous 
promise ;  which  seems  surprising,  considering  the  terms 
he  was  on  with  Cotta.  His  intimate  union  with  the 
mighty  master,  who  had  once  again  shown  his  high 
quality  in  the  festal  play  of  "  Palseophron  and  Neo- 
terpe,"  was  a  source  of  the  highest  joy.  He  found  but 
one  failing  in  him,  that  he  was  too  weak  and  soft- 
hearted to  shake  off  his  connection  with  Christiana 
Vulpius.  Schiller's  repugnance,  fostered  by  Lotte,  to 
the  partner  of  Goethe's  life  —  whom  all  the  ladies  of 
Weimar  shunned,  especially  those  of  rank  —  led  him 
to  overlook  that  the  word  and  troth  of  a  man  forbade 
Goethe  to  dissolve  a  union  which  from  the  first  had 
been  regarded  as  wedlock.  But  he  looked  upon  him 
as  the  first  of  poets,  whom  none  approached  in  depth 
and  tenderness  of  feehng,  in  nature,  truth,  and  high 
artistic  merit ;  one  more  richly  endowed  than  any  since 


442  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

Shakespeare.  Nor  to  the  gifts  bestowed  by  nature 
had  any  inau  added  more  than  he  by  untiring  research 
and  study.  He  had  explored  Nature  in  all  her  king- 
doms and  dived  into  her  depths.  Even  his  "  Theory 
of  Colours  "  he  considered  the  only  correct  one.  And 
as  a  man,  he  set  him  above  all  he  had  ever  know^n. 
"  I  think  I  may  say,"  so  he  w^rote  to  Countess  Schim- 
melmann,  "  that  during  the  six  years  I  have  lived  with 
him,  I  have  not  for  one  moment  doubted  his  character. 
There  is  a  high  sincerity,  a  sterlingness  in  his  nature, 
and  the  loftiest  zeal  for  the  right  and  good."  Even 
on  Goethe's  connection  with  the  two  Schlegels  he  was 
now  perfectly  satisfied :  he  saw  why  Goethe  would  not 
break  with  them,  though  he  knew  that  in  their  deifica- 
tion of  him  they  had  their  own  ends  in  view.  To  feel 
that  he  was  the  bosom  friend  of  this  incomparable 
man,  how  it  must  have  raised  him,  strengthened  him, 
and  made  him  happy !  That  the  malicious  "  Letters 
to  a  Lady,"  just  then  started  by  Kotzebue's  Livonian 
friend  Garlieb  Merkel,  kept  ignorantly  running  him 
dovm  together  with  the  Eomanticists  could  not  dis- 
turb Schiller,  though  he  was  vexed  that  the  Schlegel 
apotheosis  of  Goethe  was  the  very  thing  that  occa- 
sioned it.  He  scorned  such  abject  voices,  which  no 
doubt  were  great  obstacles  to  the  culture  of  taste 
aimed  at  by  him  and  Goethe. 

The  confederates  wished  to  celebrate  the  opening 
of  a  new  century  [1801]  by  theatric  festivities,  for 
which  Schiller  was  particularly  active.  After  the 
middle  of  November,  Goethe,  anxious  to  finish  his 
translation  of  Voltaire's  "  Tancred,"  sought  his  old 
familiar  lodging  in  Jena  Castle  again.  Here  he  was 
disagreeably  surprised  by  Schiller's  intimation  that 
the  duke  had  declared  against  the  Centenary,  which 
they  had  taken  up  without  consulting  the  Directory 
of  theatres.  Schiller  drew  back  in  disgust :  "  In  the 
name  of  goodness  let  us  bury  ourselves  in  our  poetics ; 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  443 

let  US  try  producing  from  within,  as  production  from 
without  has  sped  so  ill."  How  much  Goethe  regarded 
him  as  his  right-hand  man  in  matters  of  the  stage,  in 
which  he  had  neither  oifice  nor  any  particular  privi- 
lege beyond  a  free  pass  and  writing  materials,  appears 
from  the  fact  that  when  he  went  back  to  Jena  after 
December  10th,  he  entrusted  to  him  the  rehearsals  of 
Gluck's  "  Ipliigenie,"  though,  as  he  freely  avowed,  he 
understood  nothing  of  music.  "  From  three  to  five 
in  the  afternoons  I  will  with  pleasure  be  present  at 
the  rehearsals,  but  bodily  presence  is  all  I  have  in  me 
to  give,"  was  his  reply.  Gluck's  opera  made  a  most 
pure  and  beautiful  impression  on  him ;  he  thought  the 
master  might  fairly  be  placed  at  the  side  of  Mozart. 
Schiller  worked  with  marked  effect  at  the  reading 
practices,  where  with  fine  discrimination  he  led  the 
actors  into  the  spirit  of  their  parts,  the  sense  of  signifi- 
cant passages,  and  their  correct  dehvery.  He  also  had 
to  conduct  the  rehearsals  of  "  Octavia,"  which  Kotzebue 
had  written  in  rivalry  of  him.  As  Iffland  wished  to 
play  "Tancred"  at  the  approaching  coronation  feast, 
Goethe  was  obliged  to  hurry  on  the  work  with  all  his 
might.  When  it  was  done  he  came  up  to  Weimar 
again  with  Schelhng;  and  now  Schiller  could  work 
hard  at  his  own  tragedy.  The  translation  of  the 
"  Tancred  "  was  talked  over  between  them.  Schelling's 
presence  in  Goethe's  house  led  to  some  interesting 
evening  conferences.  On  the  last  evening  of  the  year 
and  century  they  met  at  the  masquerade  got  up  by 
the  court,  for  which  Goethe  had  arranged  a  proces- 
sional performance.  After  midnight  the  two  poets 
with  Schelliug  and  Steffens  retired  into  the  side-rooms, 
and  had  a  pleasant  talk  over  champagne.  Schiller 
still  liked  to  be  gay  among  the  gay. 

At  the  very  beginning  of  the  century  he  was 
doomed  in  the  saddest  way  to  be  disturbed  in  the 
poetry  that  now  at  last  came  welling  forth  from  his 


444  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

heart.  On  January  3d  Goethe  was  taken  so  violently- 
ill  that  the  worst  was  to  be  feared.  It  was  during 
these  anxious  days  that  Kotzebue's  "  Octavia "  came 
upon  the  stage.  "  The  Schillers  and  I  have  shed  many 
a  tear  over  Goethe  the  last  few  days,"  writes  Frau  von 
Stein  on  the  12th,  when  the  decisive  crisis  was  ex- 
pected. Still  more  deeply  must  Schiller  have  been 
affected,  who  possessed  in  him  the  noblest  ally  in  life 
and  hterary  pursuit.  The  next  day,  however,  he  was 
able  to  report  that  things  were  in  a  good  way.  He 
was  himself  suffering  with  a  violent  catarrh,  and  had 
to  be  extremely  careful,  as  January  and  February 
had  three  times  proved  dangerous  to  him.  Mental 
disqmet  unfitting  him  for  composition,  he  revised  his 
"  Carlos  "  and  "  Thirty  Years'  War  "  for  new  illustrated 
editions  (there  were  several  got  up,  one  an  edition  de 
luxe  of  the  "  Carlos,"  for  which  Schiller  examined  only 
the  first  six  scenes  minutely),  and  he  also  put  the  last 
touches  to  "Macbeth"  and  to  "Mary  Stuart."  At 
the  same  time  he  conducted  rehearsals,  particularly 
of  "Tancred."  Not  till  the  15th  was  Goethe  out  of 
danger ;  then  his  recovery  proceeded  rapidly.  On  the 
19  th  Schiller,  the  duke,  and  Herder  all  happened  to 
meet  at  his  house ;  a  threefold  chord  that  jarred  upon 
the  last  named.  The  same  day  Schiller  spent  over 
sixteen  dollars  at  the  town  hall,  probably  on  some 
entertainment;  the  old  club  had  been  reorganised 
there,  and  soon  after  named  Goethe,  Herder,  Schiller, 
and  Wieland  honourary  members.  The  evening  of 
the  29th,  after  rehearsal,  Schiller  was  at  Goethe's,  and 
on  the  30th  at  the  masked  ball ;  on  the  31st  came  the 
performance  of  "  Tancred,"  whose  success  he  immedi- 
ately announced  to  his  friend.  He  went  every  day 
to  Goethe,  who  to  his  joy  had  set  to  work  on  his 
"  Faust "  again.  On  the  evening  of  February  8th  he 
explained  to  him  the  intended  conclusion  of  his  new 
play.     Goethe  after  mature  deliberation  approved  it, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  445 

but  now  he  wanted  to  know  the  plan  of  the  whole 
from  the  beginning.  Schiller  read  him  the  first  three 
acts,  and  their  sympathetic  reception  spurred  him  on 
to  persevere.  Goethe  was  soon  able  to  conduct  re- 
hearsals himself,  though  some  nervous  irritability  still 
hung  about  him.  In  Schiller's  home  all  were  in  health 
and  spirits ;  his  "  wife  felt  happy  and  attached  to 
society,  but  not  dependent."  For  a  few  months  her 
cousin,  Christiane  von  Wurmb  of  the  Eudolstadt  court, 
was  with  her  on  a  visit,  and  took  singing  lessons  from 
the  actress  Jagemann.  Schiller  himself  enjoyed  the 
society  of  the  intelligent  girl. 

Finding  the  rapid  progress  of  his  work  hindered  by 
the  bustle  in  his  house  and  manifold  distractions,  he 
fled  on  March  5th  to  the  solitude  of  his  garden-house 
at  Jena.  Here  ho  found  himself  in  worse  distraction 
than  ever,  being  in  great  request  on  all  hands.  Dur- 
ing this  time  in  a  dispute  between  the  actresses  Jage- 
mann and  Vohs  for  the  part  of  Thekla,  Lotte,  with  a 
view  to  her  husband  not  losing  the  duchess's  favour, 
took  sides  with  extraordinary  ardour  against  Goethe, 
and  had  nearly  dissolved  the  league  between  the  poets ; 
but  Schiller  managed  to  steer  matters  round,  not  only 
out  of  regard  for  his  friend's  still  convalescent  state, 
but  becavise  he  saw  that  Goethe,  as  manager  of  the 
theatre,  had  a  right  to  decide.  At  Jena  he  associated 
much  with  Niethammer  and  Schelling,  and  once,  at 
Griesbach's  house,  he  was  very  merry  with  some  of 
the  students.  Then  violent  winds  set  in,  which  not 
only  made  the  slightly  built  garden-house  uncomfort- 
able to  live  in,  but  for  many  days  kept  him  from  going 
out.  When  Lotte  on  April  1st  fetched  him  away  from 
Jena,  he  had  ended  the  last  act  but  one  of  the  "  Maid 
of  Orleans."  As  Goethe  was  gone  to  his  country-seat, 
Schiller  on  coming  home  kept  himself  entirely  secluded, 
that  he  might  get  the  last  act  done  in  a  fortnight.  This 
by  main  force  he  accomplished,  but  was  so  weakened 


446  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

by  the  work  that,  on  his  friend's  return,  he  could  not 
go  to  see  him.  Goethe  found  the  play  incomparably 
fine,  good,  and  beautiful,  and  had  even  arranged  all 
about  the  distribution  of  parts.  And  now  Schiller 
was  to  adapt  Lessing's  "  Nathan  "  for  the  stage  and  con- 
duct the  rehearsals,  as  Goethe  on  the  21st  retired  to 
his  country-house  again.  His  own  happily  completed 
drama  was  immediately  sent  to  the  press. 

Instead  of  rejoicing  over  his  success,  Schiller  longed 
for  more  of  poetic  production,  which  alone  made  life 
endurable  to  him.  He  wrote  to  Goethe  on  the  28th : 
"  Just  now  I  have  my  whole  mind  engrossed  by  two 
fresh  dramatic  subjects ;  when  I  have  thought  out  and 
thoroughly  proved  these  two,  I  am  willing  to  pass  on 
to  other  work."  They  wore  the  pieces  he  had  intended 
for  the  Weimar  theatre  long  before,  "  The  Knights  of 
IVIalta "  and  "  The  Hostile  Brothers,"  each  capable  of 
being  treated  in  the  simpler  manner  of  the  Greeks. 
He  was  now  to  have  another  disagreeable  experience 
of  the  duke's  despotic  caprice.  The  latter  opposed  the 
performance  of  the  "Maid,"  because  for  particular 
reasons  he  did  not  wish  Jagemann  to  appear  in  it, 
and  to  her  the  leading  part  of  Johanna  had  been 
assigned.  He  asked  Schiller  to  let  him  see  the  MS., 
and  gave  his  opinion  against  the  exhibition,  which 
would  do  gi'eat  detriment  to  the  high  beauty  of  the 
poetry.  Schiller  well  knew  the  motive  of  this 
encroachment,  so  injurious  to  Goethe  as  well,  and  he 
at  once  assumed  a  calm  attitude.  The  duke  must  of 
course  be  in  the  right  (so  he  wrote  to  Goethe)  in  judg- 
ing that  the  piece  could  not  be  acted.  It  would  be 
doing  a  kindness  to  the  publisher,  too,  and  he  himself 
would  be  saved  the  labour  and  annoyances  of  the 
learning  by  heart  and  rehearsing.  Goethe  was  willing 
to  take  these  off  his  hands,  and  also  thought  the  diffi- 
culties of  performance  were  not  insuperable ;  but  Schil- 
ler, firmly  convinced  of  the  effectiveness  of   his  play, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  447 

was  determined  that  the  diike's  scruples,  which  really- 
had  their  origin  in  the  situation  of  his  favourite  Jage- 
mann,  should  be  disproved  by  its  success  at  other 
theatres. 

He  had  not  yet  decided  for  either  of  his  two  plans, 
when  Goethe  returned,  to  whom  he  at  once  communi- 
cated them.  For  one  of  them,  the  "  Knights,"  all  he 
wanted  now  was  the  central  dramatic  deed,  which  the 
whole  plot  leads  up  to,  and  is  unravelled  by  ;  the  other, 
the  fictitious  one,  consisting,  with  the  chorus,  of  only 
twenty  scenes,  and  numbering  no  more  than  five  char- 
acters, stood  quite  complete ;  but  notwithstanding 
Goethe's  approval,  Schiller  did  not  as  yet  feel  the  due 
degree  of  inclination  for  it.  Two  other  subjects,  "  War- 
beck  "  for  one,  he  had  not  succeeded  hitherto  in  reduc- 
ing to  proper  form.  Besides  some  other  materials  lying 
still  more  shapeless,  he  entertained  the  idea  of  a  com- 
edy;  but  on  deeper  reflection  he  felt  that  this  kind 
was  foreign  to  him,  that  his  nature  was  of  too  serious 
a  cast,  and  what  had  no  depth  did  not  interest  him 
long.  In  the  meantime,  "Mary,"  "Macbeth,"  and  a 
third  part  of  his  prose  writings  had  left  the  press. 

When  Gotta,  returning  from  Leipzig,  stopped  at 
Weimar  on  May  16th,  "  Wallenstein's  Death"  was 
performed  at  his  request;  and  Goethe  and  Schelling 
met  him  at  Schiller's  to  supper.  The  next  day  the 
two  poets  got  up  a  banquet  at  the  town  hall  in  hon- 
our of  the  guest  from  Stuttgart.  How  merrily  things 
went  at  such  meals  in  the  town  hall  comes  out  in  a 
humourous  poem  that  Goethe  afterward  addressed  to 
a  former  actress,  who,  though  she  had  not  drunk  so 
much  "  as  Schiller  and  I  and  all,"  yet  "  champagne- 
fuddled  on  my  neck  didst  fall."  This  time  Schiller 
promised  Gotta  a  treatise  on  the  female  characters  of 
the  Greeks.  But  he  could  not  get  to  it,  any  more  than 
to  dramatic  composition.  When  Goethe  set  out,  on 
June  5th,  for  Pyrmont,  to  take  the  waters,  he  tried  his 


448  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

luck  once  more  in  lyric  poetry.  Goeschen  had  asked 
him  in  January  for  a  Song  on  the  Peace,  which  he 
refused,  with  the  remark  that  Germany  had  little 
reason  to  rejoice  at  such  a  peace.  He  was  now  think- 
ing of  a  poem  on  Germany's  greatness,  outlasting  the 
German  empire's  fall,  a  country  that  in  the  Eeforma- 
tion  had  won  spiritual  freedom  for  all  Europe,  and  was 
destined  yet,  when  its  day  should  dawn,  to  shine  re- 
splendent above  all  nations.  Though  nearly  all  of  it 
was  already  sketched  out  in  prose,  and  a  part  even 
composed,  the  poem  was  never  finished ;  on  the  other 
hand,  he  now  achieved  his  Lament  on  Freedom's 
disappearance  from  the  world,  entitled  "Advent  of 
the  Xew  Century,"  his  three  stanzas  based  upon  the 
"  Jungfrau,"  and  his  gorgeous  ancient  ballad  of  "  Hero 
and  Leander."  He  intended  them  for  Cotta's  "  Damen- 
Kalender,"  but  he  had  no  objection  to  the  publisher's 
inserting  the  middle  poem  in  the  "  Almanach  "  he  was 
bringing  out  for  W.  Schlegel  and  Tieck,  a  poet  whom, 
without  jealousy,  he  left  to  take  his  own  path. 

Cold  weather  setting  in  in  the  middle  of  June 
brought  on  the  spasms  again ;  yet  at  the  end  of  the 
month  he  thought  he  might  get  his  "  Hostile  Brothers  " 
ready  to  be  played  in  a  week's  time.  Instead  of  which, 
on  July  4th,  he  took  up  the  plan  of  a  romantic  chivalry- 
play  on  a  Countess  of  Flanders.  Within  three  weeks  he 
meant  to  go  to  Dobberan  on  the  Baltic,  and  return  thence 
by  way  of  Berlin  and  Dresden.  He  wrote  to  Goethe : 
"  I  dread  some  days  of  torture  at  Berhn,  but  I  must  see 
new  objects,  I  must  make  a  decisive  experiment  on  my 
health ;  I  wish  to  see  some  good  theatrical  perform- 
ances, at  least  some  few  celebrities,  and  also,  as  it 
involves  no  great  detour,  to  meet  old  friends  again." 
Frequent  attacks  of  spasms  soon  made  him  limit  the 
journey  to  visiting  the  watering-place ;  but,  as  his  de- 
parture was  delayed,  and  it  seemed  too  late  then  for 
the 'seaside,  he  at  last  made  up  his  mind  to  a  mere 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  449 

stay  of  three  or  four  weeks  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
Dresden.  To  his  joy,  the  Leipzig  and  Hamburg  thea- 
tres were  now  asking  for  the  "  Jungfrau."  There  was 
also  a  prospect  of  its  acceptance  at  Berhn,  though  the 
author  was  horrified  by  a  declaration  of  Schroder,  to 
whom  he  had  given  the  MS.,  and  who  was  then  at 
Weimar,  namely,  that  the  miracles,  on  which  the  whole 
action  rests,  would  have  to  be  taken  out.  This  could 
be  done  easily  enough,  only  the  catastrophe  would 
require  to  be  altered. 

On  August  5th  the  Schiller  family  set  out,  accom- 
panied by  Frau  von  Wolzogen,  whose  husband,  in  two 
visits  to  Petersburg,  had  arranged  the  betrothal  of  the 
Hereditary  Prince  of  Weimar  to  the  Grand  Duchess 
Maria  Paulovna.  They  travelled  through  Leipzig  to 
Dresden,  arrived  there  on  the  9th,  and  at  once  moved 
into  the  house  at  Loschwitz.  Here  Korner  came  to 
see  them  every  evening.  The  two  friends  poured  out 
their  hearts  with  the  old  trustfulness,  talked  over  all 
their  plans,  and  cheered  each  other  to  renewed  activity. 
Even  here  Schiller  had  attacks  of  his  malady,  but 
Korner  rejoiced  to  see  the  health  and  vigour  of  his 
wonderful  mind.  He  particularly  pressed  him  to  get 
better  paid  by  the  publishers.  On  September  1st 
Schiller  went  up  to  Dresden,  where  the  inspection  of 
the  antiques,  in  the  light  of  the  higher  insight  gained 
from  the  teachings  of  Goethe  and  Meyer,  made  a  pow- 
erful impression  on  him.  Frau  von  Wolzogen  stayed 
behind  at  Dresden,  when  Schiller,  accompanied  by 
Korner,  went  to  Leipzig  on  the  15th.  On  their  way 
Goeschen  was  greeted  at  his  country-seat  at  Hohenstedt, 
and  the  old  friendship  heartily  renewed.  At  Leipzig 
Schiller  attended  the  representation  of  his  "  Jungfrau." 
On  entering  his  box  he  was  received  with  kettle-drums 
and  trumpets.  After  the  first  act  the  house  rang  with 
repeated  shouts  of  "  Long  live  Friedrich  Schiller ! "  and 
he  had  to  testify  his  thanks  by  stepping  forward.     As 


4SO  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

he  left  the  theatre,  all  drew  back  reverently  with  bared 
heads  ;  they  cried,  "  Long  hve  Schiller,  the  great  man  !  " 
and  parents  pointed  him  out  to  their  children.  By  way 
of  drawback,  the  performance  had  given  him  a  low 
opinion  of  the  Leipzig  company.  He  found,  to  his 
joyful  surprise,  that  new  editions  were  already  wanted 
of  his  "  Mary  "  and  "  Macbeth."  That  Merkel,  as  impu- 
dent as  he  was  shallow,  should  set  Kotzebue's  "  Oc- 
tavia  "  above  "  Wallenstein  "  and  "  Mary  "  was  no  more 
than  he  expected  ;  why,  Goethe  was  treated  a  great  deal 
worse,  and  not  the  vaguest  sense  of  artistic  finish  was 
to  be  looked  for  in  such  vulgar  minds.  During  this 
journey  he  had  sent  his  "  Jungfrau  "  to  the  Berlin  and 
Vienna  theatres,  and  had  received  so  much  money 
from  Cotta,  Goeschen,  and  Crusius  that  he  came  back 
with  more  than  he  went. 

At  Weimar  he  felt  better  than  he  had  done  all  the  sum- 
mer. Goethe  had  also  come  back  in  good  health,  but  had 
his  hands  quite  full  with  the  Art  Exhibition,  the  thea- 
tre, and  the  arrangement  of  parties  given  at  his  house 
to  the  actress  Unzelmann,  who  had  come  on  a  starring 
tour  from  Berlin.  On  the  21st  she  appeared  in  "  Mary  ; " 
but  with  all  the  refined  tenderness  and  great  intelli- 
gence of  her  acting,  Schiller  missed  in  it  the  high  tragic 
style,  as  indeed  this  was  wanting  to  all  the  Iffland 
school,  who  aimed  at  an  ordinary  colloquial  tone  and 
the  greatest  possible  naturalness.  On  the  30th  he 
began  to  work  out  the  plot  of  his  "  Warbeck."  Having 
observed  at  Leipzig  how  the  actors  mangled  the  verse, 
and  that  good  commonplace  nature  was  all  the  public 
cared  for,  he  was  in  some  doubt  whether  he  ought  not 
rather  to  write  his  plays  in  prose ;  but  the  feeling  that 
with  a  prose  setting  he  could  not  have  combined  that 
delight  in  his  theme  without  which  he  never  could 
compose,  was  enough  to  warn  him  off.  Unluckily,  a 
catarrh  soon  debarred  him  from  any  prolonged  exertion. 
The  "  Warbeck  "  could  make  the  less  progress,  as  the 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  451 

difficulties  showed  themselves  gi-eater,  though  these  only 
heightened  Schiller's  interest.  Mindful  of  Korner's 
advice,  he  wrote  to  Unger,  saying  that  he  must  have 
a  good  round  sum  for  a  new  "  Theater-Kalender  ; "  the 
result  was  an  offer  of  one  thousand  thalers.  To  Cotta's 
inquiry,  what  drama  he  might  expect  from  him  at 
Easter,  he  plainly  declared  on  October  13th,  that  hav- 
ing now  reached  that  point  of  swift  and  decided  success 
which  he  had  aimed  at  for  years,  he  must  raise  the 
price  of  his  labours ;  to  this  he  was  driven  by  the  en- 
deavour to  impart  a  higher  intrinsic  value  to  his  com- 
positions. With  his  wavering  health  he  could  write 
only  one  important  play  in  a  year ;  the  higher  pay 
should  improve  not  his  circumstances,  but  his  works. 
To  his  demand  of  three  hundred  ducats  for  every  new 
original  work  of  the  largest  sort,  Cotta  consented  with 
a  good  grace,  and  even  added  that  he  would  gladly  do 
what  more  he  could  besides.  At  this  time  Unger 
brought  out  the  "  Maid  of  Orleans  "  in  the  form  of  an 
annual,  and  that  unaccompanied  by  any  other  piece. 
A  little  before  that  the  news  had  come  upon  him  like 
a  blow  that  the  performance  of  the  play  was  prohibited 
at  Vienna. 

When  Goethe,  on  the  18th,  went  to  Jena  for  a  time, 
Schiller,  though  still  a  sufferer,  undertook  the  manage- 
ment of  the  theatre.  Again  he  found  he  made  but 
little  headway  with  the  "  Warbeck ; "  not  to  lose  his 
time  altogether,  he  tried  his  hand  on  what  he  had  long 
had  in  his  mind,  an  adaptation  to  the  stage  of  Gozzi's 
"  Turandot,"  to  which  he  hoped  to  lend  a  higher  worth 
by  giving  to  it  sometliing  of  poetic  spirit.  Goethe 
strove  at  that  time  to  educate  both  players  and  public 
by  putting  dramas  on  the  stage  of  the  most  different 
nations  and  styles.  Coming  up  to  Weimar  for  the 
duchess-dowager's  birthday,  which  was  celebrated  with 
a  play  of  Terence  acted  in  masks,  he  imparted  to  his 
friend  his  intention  in  mid-November  to  begin  holding 


452  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

a  cheerful  Wednesday  assembly  at  his  house  once  a 
fortnight,  in  wliich  seven  ladies  and  six  gentlemen 
beside  himself  should  take  part,  the  divorced  countess 
Heuriette  von  EglofCstein  to  be  Goethe's  partner,  then 
Lotte,  Carohne  von  Wolzogen,  Amalie  von  Imhoff,  the 
court  ladies  Von  Gijchhausen  and  Von  Wolfskeel,  Meyer, 
Wolzogen,  Voigt,  and  Captain  von  Wolfskeel ;  the  duke, 
the  princes,  and  Princess  Carohne  were  also  to  be  in- 
vited. And  he  meant  there  should  be  no  lack  of  festal 
songs.  On  Schiller's  birthday  Goethe  returned  to 
Weimar.  The  same  evening  he  congratulated  his 
friend  by  letter,  and  invited  him  to  the  first  Wednes- 
day Assembly  on  the  morrow,  as  the  "  second  day  of 
the  feast,"  thereby  associating  these  meetings  with 
Schiller's  birthday.  The  first  Assembly,  for  which 
Goethe  composed  an  "  Inauguration  Ode,"  passed  off 
very  pleasantly.  Schiller  was  glad  to  have  such  oc- 
casions to  prompt  him  to  write  songs,  though  he  meant 
to  give  them  a  loftier  tone.  But  he  soon  felt  too  ill 
to  go  out  to  Goethe's  in  the  evenings.  Nevertheless, 
they  both  joined  in  conducting  the  rehearsals  of 
"  Nathan  the  Wise,"  which  was  brought  on  the  stage 
with  great  success  on  the  28th,  and  thereupon  was 
asked  for  at  Berlin  also.  The  measles,  then  prevalent 
at  Weimar,  prevented  the  second  Assembly  from  being 
held.  At  the  beginning  of  December,  Schiller's  Ernst 
was  seized  with  them,  and  then  the  other  children, 
while  Lotte  had  bad  coughs,  and  when  all  seemed  in  a 
good  way  again,  she  suffered  from  a  very  severe  attack 
of  the  epidemic,  so  that  their  small  habitation  became 
a  hospital.  Notwithstanding  all,  Schiller,  who  was 
obliged  to  keep  the  house,  completed  "Turandot"  on 
the  27th.  But  directly  after,  he  found  himself  so 
weakened  by  an  attack  of  cholera,  that  he  had  to  miss 
the  second  Assembly,  held  on  the  last  day  of  the  year, 
for  which  he  had  begun  a  couple  of  songs. 

The  second  day  of  the  New  Year  he  was  able  to 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  453 

attend  the  performance,  got  up  by  Goethe,  of  Wilhelm 
Schlegel's  "  Ion,"  a  masterpiece  of  pedantry  of  verse- 
construction  (for  besides  trimeters  it  contained  some 
difficult  Greek  metres)  and  of  theatric  arrangement. 
But  with  the  play  itself  Schiller  was  not  quite  satis- 
fied, and  the  enemies  of  the  Schlegels  (for  it  had  come 
out  that  Wilhelm  was  the  author)  tried  in  every  way 
to  cry  it  down.  Schiller,  who  had  again  begun  visiting 
his  friend  regularly,  did  not  keep  back  his  own  opinion. 
Goethe,  before  leaving  for  Jena  on  the  17th,  talked 
over  with  him  all  the  affairs  of  the  theatre,  particularly 
that  of  bringing  out  "  Turandot."  He  came  back  on 
the  28th,  and  superintended  the  show  he  had  planned 
for  the  birthday  masquerade  of  the  29th.  The  next 
day  "  Turandot "  met  with  great  applause,  however  ill 
wishers  might  spend  their  wit  upon  it.  It  was  repeated 
on  February  2d,  with  the  addition  of  some  new  enig- 
mas. Goethe  contributed  one  on  "  Leap-day,"  and 
SchiUer  put  the  answer  into  poetry. 

We  here  give  a  translation  of  Goethe's  enigma : 

"A  brother,  he,  of  many  brothers, 
And  like  them  all  in  everything, 
A  needful  member  to  the  others, 
All  children  of  one  mighty  king. 
And  yet  he's  seldom  seen  in  fact, 
Like  th'  alien  child  in  nursery  fable, 
The  rest  will  never  let  him  act. 
Save  where  they  find  themselves  unable." 

In  the  meantime,  the  duchess  had  expressed  through 
Frau  von  Stein  her  desire  that  Schiller  would  in  future 
show  himself  more  at  court.  Not  without  bitterness 
did  he  reply  to  his  lady  friend :  "  Now  that  I  have 
lived  here  two  years  without  being  invited  to  court 
(for  even  at  the  duchess  dowager's  court  I  never  was 
in  high  company),  I  should  wish  for  the  future  also  to 
remain  excluded    from  it,   on    account  of  my   feeble 


454  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

health.  For  myself  I  am  not,  as  you  know,  desirous 
of  any  distinction  but  what  is  personal ;  and  to  deserve 
and  receive  the  favour  of  my  gracious  master  and  the 
gracious  duchess  is  all  that  I  aim  at."  The  narrow 
limits  of  his  lodgings,  where  he  could  not  get  the 
quiet  needful  for  his  labours,  had  made  him  resolve 
some  months  before  to  buy  a  certain  house  :  it  was  the 
one  on  the  Esplanade  with  a  pleasant  southward  front, 
formerly  inhabited  l:)y  Countess  von  Bachoff,  and  last 
by  MelUsh ;  which,  like  the  street  itself,  now  bears 
the  name  of  Schiller,  and  is  eternally  hallowed  to  his 
memory.  He,  therefore,  on  February  5th,  requested  of 
Cotta  the  loan  of  twenty-six  hundred  gulden,  offering 
to  pay  four  per  cent,  interest.  He  also  begged  Goeschen 
to  let  him  have  in  May  the  price  of  his  newly  revised 
edition,  altered  only  in  style,  of  the  "  Thirty  Years' 
War,"  as  all  he  could  raise  was  wanted  for  the  purchase 
of  the  house.  Accordingly,  he  could  not  think  of  con- 
tinuing his  payments  to  Korner.  His  Jena  garden  he 
offered  for  sale  to  Hufeland,  but  they  could  not  agree 
about  the  price.  For  some  time  his  mother's  illness 
had  caused  him  anxiety.  The  good  woman,  who,  with 
her  narrow  means,  was  always  cheerful,  contented,  and 
most  grateful  for  the  smallest  kindness,  had  kept  on 
her  lodging  at  Leonberg,  even  after  her  daughter 
Luise,  in  October,  1799,  married  Parson  Frankh,  of 
Clever-Sulzbach  in  the  Neckar  circle,  and  had  only 
visited  her  daughter  occasionally.  Her  greatest  pleas- 
ure was  to  send  her  own  homespun  linen  to  her  Fritz 
and  his  family,  and  to  receive  a  kindly  word  and  good 
news  from  the  loved  ones.  The  preceding  December 
she  had  repaired  to  Stuttgart  for  the  cure  of  her  com- 
plaint, and  there  met  with  the  kindest  reception  from 
the  widow  of  Lieutenant  Stoll,  and  the  most  careful 
treatment  from  Schiller's  friend,  JacobL  Fritz  had 
a  special  twenty-five  gulden  conveyed  to  her  through 
Cotta,  and  warmly  sympathised  in  her  incurable  mal- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  455 

ady,  which  soon  grew  so  much  worse  that  Luise  took 
her  to  herself.  Nothing  was  omitted  that  could 
alleviate  her  sufferings. 

Schiller,  meanwhile,  had  found  a  new  dramatic  sub- 
ject in  "  Wilhelm  Tell,"  which  Goethe  had  once 
designed  for  epic  treatment.  A  rumour  had  spread 
a  year  before,  that  he  was  working  at  a  drama  on  the 
Swiss  hero ;  and  now  the  subject  struck  him  as  a 
highly  significant  one  after  his  "  Juugfrau ; "  yet  he 
worked  it  out  but  languidly,  for  a  multiplicity  of  cares 
unfitted  him  for  any  vigorous  effort.  He  only  felt  in 
the  key  for  lyric  composition  ;  and  then  it  was  that  he 
brought  out,  besides  many  smaller  poems,  mostly  begun 
before,  his  splendid  ballad  of  "  Cassandra."  And  being 
once  in  train,  he  gave  himself  up  to  the  lyric  impulse 
that  seized  him  at  the  first  foretokenings  of  spring, 
especially  as  he  had  promised  a  few  things  for  Cotta's 
"  Damen-Kalender,"  and  for  the  "  Kecreations "  of 
Becker  of  Dresden. 

Schiller  kept  pressing  Goethe,  who  still  lingered  at 
Jena,  to  give  a  parting  Assembly  to  the  hereditary 
prince,  who,  on  February  24th,  was  leaving  with 
Wolzogen  for  Paris,  to  be  presented  to  Napoleon  ;  else 
Kotzebue  would  cut  in  before  him,  and  the  prince 
himself  was  anxious  to  avoid  the  intruder.  This 
nimble  playwright,  who,  on  the  assassination  of  Paul 
I.,  had  come  away  from  Petersburg  an  Imperial  Col- 
legiate Councillor,  and,  when  relieved  of  his  post  as 
manager  of  the  German  Court  Players'  Company,  had 
retained  the  whole  salary,  was  now  settled  at  Weimar, 
where  he  intended  to  oust  Goethe  from  the  favour  of 
the  court,  and  set  up  for  a  great  poet  himseK.  In  the 
meanwhile  he  treated  Schiller  with  civility  by  way  of 
contrast.  Goethe  had,  indeed,  returned  his  visit,  and 
admitted  his  plays,  for  which  he  charged  nothing,  to 
the  stage;  but  there  could  be  no  friendship  between 
them,  as   Goethe  at  once    saw  through  his   purpose. 


45^  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

and  gauged  his  shallow  superficiahty.  With  Goethe's 
opponents  he  stood  on  the  best  of  terms,  particularly 
with  the  artists  of  the  Prussian  capital,  on  whom  he 
kept  his  eye,  for  the  poet  had  offended  them  by 
declaring  that  the  prosaic  spirit  of  the  age  seemed  to 
have  revealed  itself  most  at  Berlin.  Matters  came 
to  a  breach  when  Goethe,  following  his  invariable  rule, 
struck  out  of  Kotzebue's  "  German  Provincials  "  all  the 
personal  hits  aimed  at  Weimar  and  Jena,  and  at 
the  Schlegels  above  all,  who  were  at  feud  with  the 
author.  Thereupon  Kotzebue  appealed  to  Schiller, 
who  had  no  official  connection  with  the  management, 
and  whom  he  would  have  hked  to  estrange  from 
Goethe.  But  he  declared  that  Goethe  was  right  in 
letting  nothing  pass  that  would  provoke  party  spirit. 
"  For  my  own  part,"  he  wrote,  "  I  assure  you  once 
more,  there  is  nothing  in  your  play  that  I  take  to 
myself  ;  though  I  feel  sure  that  all  those  whom  it  may 
concern  to  breed  strife  betwixt  us  will  not  fail  to  see 
an  attack  upon  me  in  that  verse  with  which  you  close 
one  act,  but  which  you  can  scarcely  have  meant  for  me 
alone.  And  even  if  it  were  so,  I  should  not  go  to  war 
with  you  about  it ;  the  hcense  of  comedy  is  large,  and 
sportive  humour  may  take  many  hberties  ;  only  passion 
must  be  shut  out."  But  Schiller's  advising  him  to  con- 
cession, which  would  only  redound  to  his  credit,  as 
the  piece  would  lose  none  of  its  theatric  value  by  the 
omissions,  was  all  thrown  away ;  Kotzebue  withdrew 
the  piece  in  a  rage,  nay,  there  is  said  to  have  been 
an  unlovely  scene  over  it  at  the  dowager  duchess's  be- 
tween Goethe,  Kotzebue,  and  his  wife.  Before  this 
Kotzebue  had  set  up,  in  opposition  to  Goethe's  Wednes- 
day meetings,  a  more  showy  Thursday  party,  at  which 
theatricals  and  all  sorts  of  amusements  delighted  the 
aristocratic  company  ;  even  the  ducal  family  had  taken 
part  in  it,  seeing  that  Herr  von  Kotzebue  kept  open 
house  and  cut  a  figure.      His  intention  of  preparing 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  457 

a  farewell  feast  to  the  departing  prince  was  happily 
defeated  by  Goethe's  coming  home  in  time ;  and 
the  Assembly,  where  two  festal  songs  by  Goethe, 
and  one  by  Schiller,  were  sung,  passed  off  right  pleas- 
antly. Soon  after  this,  Professor  Hufeland  brought  up 
to  Weimar  the  master-mason  and  musician  Zelter,  who 
had  set  many  of  the  songs  in  the  "  Almanach,"  and 
just  lately  Schiller's  "  Diver."  Goethe  sent  him  to 
Schiller's,  whom  he  was  to  bring  back  to  dinner. 
When  Schiller  was  gone  to  dress,  Zelter  struck  a  few 
notes  on  the  piano,  and  then  sang  his  "  Diver "  to 
himself.  Before  the  first  stanza  was  over,  Schiller 
came  softly  into  the  room,  only  half-dressed,  and 
began  uttering  his  joy  in  the  words :  "  That's  it !  just 
how  it  should  be ! "  Lotte,  however,  besought  him  to 
dress  and  have  done  with  it,  for  Goethe  could  not 
bear  to  wait.  Schiller  got  on  capitally  with  the  jolly, 
sturdy  man,  whose  gay  court  attire  was  little  in  keep- 
ing with  his  nature.  He  introduced  him  to  Princess 
Caroline,  too,  who  had  only  recently  been  presented  at 
court,  and  was  fond  of  Schiller,  though  she  was  preju- 
diced against  his  plays  by  her  governess,  whose  nerves 
could  not  endure  "  those  long  Schillerian  things." 
Goethe  accompanied  Zelter  back  to  Jena. 

In  the  meantime  Kotzebue  had  devised  a  master- 
stroke. He  proposed  to  celebrate  the  evening  of 
Schiller's  name-day,  March  5th,  magnificently  at  the 
town  hall,  with  performances  out  of  his  works.  The 
Countess  von  Egloffstein  was  to  figure  as  the  Maid  of 
Orleans,  Amalie  von  Imhoff  as  Queen  Ehzabeth  of 
Spain,  Kotzebue  himself  as  old  Thibaut ;  the  poetess 
Mereau  of  Jena  was  to  declaim  the  "  Bell,"  and  when 
Kotzebue  as  Master  Bell-founder  smashed  the  paste- 
board mould,  out  of  it  was  to  come  Dannecker's  bust 
of  Schiller,  and  the  poet  himself  be  crowned  by  ladies' 
hands.  Schiller  had  felt  unable  to  refuse  his  presence, 
Princess  Caroline  was  to  be  there,  and  old  Wieland 


458  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

was  invited,  too.  But  the  cunningly  devised  farce 
went  miserably  to  pieces  on  the  burgomaster's  refusal 
to  give  up  the  keys  of  the  new  saloon,  as  the  stage 
they  had  brought  over  from  Ettersburg  must  not  be 
set  up  in  it.  The  library,  too,  had  refused  to  lend  the 
bust.  Terrible  was  the  outcry  of  the  intended  partic- 
ipants, while  Goethe  all  the  while  stayed  quietly  at  Jena, 
and  Schiller  and  Lotte  had  royal  fun  over  the  failure. 
When  the  Countess  Egloft'stein  informed  him  by  letter 
of  the  sad  disappointment,  Schiller,  as  though  he  really 
deplored  it,  expressed  his  hope  that  the  pleasure  he 
had  anticipated  from  the  exhibition  was  only  delayed, 
and  he  was  grateful  for  the  kindly  sentiments  of  such 
dear  and  honoured  friends.  If  it  had  actually  come 
off,  he  would  very  likely  have  pleaded  indisposition. 
The  great  dramatist,  whom  by  this  sinister  adulation 
they  had  hoped  to  separate  from  Goethe,  was  then 
working  at  his  "  Tell,"  with  a  vigour  and  absorption 
that  he  had  not  felt  for  long.  At  the  same  time  he 
thought  of  writing  out  "  The  Hostile  Brothers,"  which 
might  be  finished  in  autunm,  and  come  on  the  boards 
about  New  Year ;  he  was  so  bent  on  making  up  the 
long  arrears  of  the  wanter  that  he  would  dispense  with 
any  travelling.  That  "  Tell  "  was  a  bold  undertaking 
he  was  well  aware,  but  he  thought  the  subject  worth 
doing  anything  for. 

As  the  "  Maid  of  Orleans  "  had  been  much  applauded 
at  other  theatres,  especially  in  Berlin,  people  were 
asking  now  to  see  it  at  Weimar ;  but  as  the  duke  had 
decidedly  pronounced  against  it,  Schiller  wished  to 
have  it  played  at  Lauchstadt  first.  Goethe  told  him 
he  ought  now,  especially  with  a  view  to  Lauchstadt, 
where  tliey  were  raising  a  new  building  for  the  theatre, 
to  do  something  for  his  older  pieces  ;  but  he  could  find 
all  the  less  time  for  that,  as  he  had  undertaken  at 
Goethe's  wish  the  adaptation  of  his  "  Iphigenia."  Of 
his   own   works  he   only  revised    "  Don    Carlos "    for 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  459 

that  purpose.  It  was  then  he  first  ventured  to  let 
Domingo  come  on  the  stage  as  a  Dominican  friar ;  till 
then  the  stage  edition  had  put  in  his  place  a  secretary 
of  state,  Perez.  To  explain  the  plot  he  inserted  the 
partly  rhymed  monologue  which  we  give  here  in 
facsimile. 

On  the  24th,  Goethe  having  returned  the  day  before, 
another  Assembly  was  held,  at  which  all  were  present 
but  the  Wolzogens,  then  absent  from  Weimar.  The 
purchase  of  the  house  had  been  concluded  a  week 
earlier:  on  the  26th  were  paid  down  the  twenty-six 
hundred  gulden  advanced  by  Cotta,  a  fortnight  later 
six  hundred  dollars  received  from  Lotte's  mother,  and 
the  remainder  by  two  instalments  in  May,  for  which 
he  borrowed  twenty-two  hundred  dollars  from  farmer 
Weidner  of  Nieder-rossla.  But  just  as  his  heart  was 
rejoicing  over  the  new  house,  he  received  sorrowful 
tidings  of  his  mother  :  to  begin  with,  a  last  letter  from 
herself,  in  which  she  said  very  calmly  that  there  was 
no  getting  better  for  her,  and  she  took  leave  of  him 
with  gratitude  for  God's  goodness  and  her  son's  love ; 
then  further  communications  from  sister  Luise  and 
friend  Hoven,  which  left  him  no  hope.  He  replied  on 
the  10th,  thanking  his  sister  for  all  that  she  and  her 
husband  had  done  for  the  good  mother,  and  promising 
to'  forward  through  Cotta  the  money  requisite  for 
reimbursement  of  expenses. 

A  violent  and  prolonged  catarrh  now  rendered  him 
incapable  of  any  poetic  labour.  To  this  was  added  his 
vexation  that  Goethe  was  not  to  be  dissuaded  from 
bringing  on  the  stage,  in  spite  of  all  opponents,  that 
singular  work,  the  "  Alarcos "  of  Friedrich  Schlegel. 
He  went  back  to  Jena,  and  Schiller  took  the  manage- 
ment of  the  theatre.  Under  painful  anxiety  for  his 
mother,  he  moved  into  his  new  dwelling  on  April 
29th,  little  dreaming  that  on  that  very  day  she  was 
released  from  her  sufferings  by  a  tranquil  death.     A 


460  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

letter  from  Luise,  received  May  3d,  held  out  a  prospect 
of  her  speedy  dissolution.  On  the  8th,  Cotta,  passing 
through  to  Leipzig,  confided  to  Lotte  that  he  had  seen 
an  announcement  of  the  death  in  the  Suahian  Mercury. 
On  being  told  by  Lotte,  Schiller  answered  with  com- 
posure ;  yet  when  she  received  the  explicit  information 
from  his  brother-in-law,  she  dared  not  renew  his  grief 
by  handing  it  to  him  at  once.  "  I  saw  him  sit  so 
peaceful  at  his  work  this  morning,"  she  writes  on  the 
10th,  "that  I  could  not  possibly  have  the  heart  to  let 
him  know  the  certainty.  He  must  see  the  letter 
to-morrow."  The  deceased  rests  in  Clever-Sulzbach 
churchyard ;  the  poet  Moricke  had  a  plain  stone  cross 
set  up  over  her  with  the  inscription, "  Here  lies  Schiller's 
mother."  The  graves  of  the  father  and  Nanette,  in  the 
now  disused  burial-ground  at  Gerlingen,  near  the  Sol- 
itude, are  no  longer  to  be  found. 

During  Goethe's  absence,  Schiller  conducted  the 
rehearsals  of  "  Iphigenia  "  and  "  Alarcos."  In  vain  he 
protested  that  with  the  second  they  would  certainly 
suffer  a  total  defeat,  and  thereby  ensure  a  triumph  to 
the  wretched  matter-of-fact  party ;  his  friend  main- 
tained that  with  outward  success  or  non-success  they 
had  nothing  to  do ;  they  would  gain  by  its  performance 
the  advantage  of  having  its  intricate  metres,  which 
were  part  of  its  very  essence,  spoken  and  heard  on 
the  stage.  The  evening  his  "  Iphigenia "  was  acted, 
the  15th,  Goethe  drove  up  to  the  playhouse  as  an  out- 
sider, and  saw  his  own  drama,  as  adapted  and  carefully 
practised  by  Schiller,  produce  a  serious  and  noble 
effect.  He  himself  then  took  the  most  extraordinary 
pains  with  that  unfortunate  "  Alarcos,"  which,  when 
played  on  the  29th,  raised  such  a  storm  of  opposition 
and  even  of  hooting,  that  he  never  dared  to  bring  it  on 
again.  Schiller  sat  by  the  duke,  who  kept  abusing  it 
dreadfully,  so  that  against  his  own  conviction  he  had 
to  defend  Goethe's  design  in  the  representation.     Cotta 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  461 

had  arrived  at  Schiller's  the  same  day.  Goethe,  having 
visitors  himself  that  evening,  could  not  accept  an  invi- 
tation to  meet  him.  Schiller  was  so  heartily  devoted 
to  Cotta,  that  he  warned  him  against  publishing 
Goethe's  complete  translation  of  Cellini,  not  being 
aware  of  the  high  importance  he  had  managed  to 
impart  to  it  by  a  valuable  appendix ;  he  even  declared 
there  was  no  good  bargain  to  be  made  with  Goethe, 
who  rated  himself  so  high,  and  had  never  been  satis- 
fied with  any  pubhsher,  and  some  of  them  perhaps  as 
little  with  him.  Yet,  in  fact,  Goethe  had  never  fallen 
out  with  any  but  Goeschen,  who  had  treated  him  both 
dishonestly  and  shamefully,  and  Unger,  who  had  by  no 
means  broken  with  him  :  and  it  was  Schiller  himself 
that  had  brought  him  into  contact  with  Cotta.  It  is 
true,  Goethe  had  no  favourable  opinion  of  publishers  ia 
general,  but  Schiller  can  only  have  been  surprised  into 
such  a  statement  by  excessive  care  for  Cotta's  interest, 
and  a  passing  fit  of  ill-humour. 

Unhappily  the  first  few  months  that  Schiller  lived 
in  a  house  of  his  own  proved  not  so  favourable  to  his 
poetry  as  he  had  hoped.  New  arrangements,  large 
repairs  unexpectedly  found  necessary,  and  then  visi- 
tors coming  up  to  Weimar  fair,  would  not  let  him 
settle  down  to  work,  and  this  threw  him  into  the 
worst  of  moods.  A  stay  of  some  three  months  at 
Berhn,  which  he  had  been  planning,  came  to  nothing; 
nay,  he  felt  so  out  of  sorts,  that  he  did  not  even  com- 
ply with  Goethe's  invitation  to  Lauchstadt.  Even  the 
news  that  the  duke  was  applying  at  Vienna  for  a  title 
of  nobility,  to  be  bestowed  on  Schiller  free  of  cost, 
could  scarcely  cheer  him  up.  He  complains  on  June 
24th :  "  Ever  since  my  Dresden  journey  I  have  not 
succeeded  in  settling  down,  or  in  getting  the  better  of 
a  spirit  of  distraction  which  has  taken  possession  of 
me.  I  have  a  good  many  things  stored  up  too,  but 
they  still  wait  a  happy  unloading."     Two  days  after 


462  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

he  and  his  family  were  seized  with  a  violent,  convul- 
sive cough,  which  hindered  him  in  speaking.  At 
Goethe's  long-looked-for  return  from  Lauchstadt  he 
was  not  quite  rid  of  the  cough  yet,  and  had  to  avoid 
the  evening  air.  On  learning  through  Voigt  that  he 
was  ennobled,  and  receiving  from  him  his  coat  of  arms, 
designed  after  that  of  the  Schillers  of  the  Tirol,  as  well 
as  a  sketch  of  his  life  to  be  sent  up  to  Vienna,  he  felt 
vexed,  as  fearing  he  might  be  drawn  out  of  his  quiet 
position  into  the  whirl  of  court  life.  All  this  time 
he  had  not  decided  for  any  one  of  his  three  dramatic 
plans,  till,  at  length,  in  mid-August,  shortly  before  the 
completion  of  the  house  repairs,  he  snatched  up  the 
one  that  was  most  fully  developed  and  could  soonest 
be  finished,  "  The  Hostile  Brothers,"  which,  rechris- 
tened  as  "  Bride  of  Messina,"  he  hoped  to  bring  on  the 
stage  in  time  for  the  duchess's  birthday.  After  that 
he  intended  to  go  to  his  "  Warbeck,"  and  lastly  to 
"  Tell,"  which  might  be  a  "  confounded  task,"  but  he 
had  already  translated  the  material  out  of  history  into 
poetry,  and  the  main  pillars  of  the  edifice  stood  firm. 

Meanwhile  an  event  had  occurred,  which  had  been 
so  earnestly  desired  by  him  and  his  family  twelve 
years  before,  but  could  hardly  be  of  much  consequence 
now.  The  Elector  of  Mainz  had  died  on  July  25th, 
and  the  Koadjutor  had  arrived  at  that  dignity  at  last. 
Schiller,  who  after  sending  him  his  "  Wallenstein  "  had 
not  once  addressed  himself  to  Dalberg,  now  wrote  on 
August  6th  to  congratulate  him  on  his  elevation.  But 
tlie  maintenance  of  an  Electorate  of  Mainz  was  highly 
problematic :  the  decision  was  supposed  to  rest  with 
the  Deputies  of  the  Empire  summoned  the  same  day 
to  Regensburg;  in  reahty  it  lay  at  Paris.  The  new 
elector  arch-chancellor  was  in  the  very  thick  of 
troubles  when  on  the  28th  he  replied  to  Schiller  that 
his  sublime  and  cliaste  muse  had  often  waked  in  him 
a  love  of  the  morally  beautiful  and  good,  and  prompted 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  463 

the  desire  some  day  to  discharge  Germany's  debt  of 
thanks  to  the  first  of  German  poets ;  he  was  now 
nearer  the  goal,  but  not  yet  certain  of  its  attainment. 
So  now  Schiller  could  not  but  look  intently  to  the 
issue  of  the  long  drawn-out  negotiations.  About  the 
same  time  the  division  of  his  mother's  inheritance  was 
settled,  which  Schiller  could  not  afford  to  lose,  be- 
cause of  his  children  and  the  precarious  state  of  his 
health,  glad  as  he  would  have  been  to  hand  it  over 
to  his  sister,  who  had  much  to  bear  from  Eeinwald's 
peevishness  and  parsimony ;  to  his  own  share  fell  by 
agreement  the  sum  of  880  gulden. 

He  was  now  giving  his  whole  mind  to  the  new 
drama  that  had  lived  so  long  within  him,  in  which  for 
the  first  time  he  was  to  fashion  a  chorus  in  the  manner 
of  the  ancients,  and  that  a  very  different  affair  from 
the  one  in  Kotzebue's  "  Hussites  before  Naumburg ; " 
for  in  this  long-cherished  design,  too,  the  deft-handed 
play-manufacturer  had  forestalled  him.  With  Schiller 
composition  was  now  going  on  so  well  that  ho  hoped 
to  have  done  by  the  middle  of  November ;  in  no  other 
work  had  he  learned  so  much,  he  writes  to  Goethe. 
On  October  30th,  the  poet  Voss  and  his  wife,  who  had 
moved  from  Eutin  to  Jena,  came  over  to  Weimar  in 
company  with  the  Griesbach  family,  and  called  on 
Schiller ;  they  occupied  the  same  rooms  in  Griesbach's 
house  that  Schiller  had  once  inhabited.  Schiller  gave 
them  a  hearty  reception  as  they  alighted  at  his  front 
door ;  in  his  kindly,  pale  countenance  there  was  some- 
thing pathetic.  They  stayed  to  dinner,  and  a  most 
genial  intercourse  sprang  up  between  them,  which  led 
Voss  to  foresee  cordial  intimacy  in  the  future. 

The  newspapers  had  already  announced  the  enno- 
bling of  Schiller  in  September  ;  the  patent  and  escutch- 
eon arrived  only  on  November  16th,  together  with 
some  friendly  lines  from  the  duke  and  from  Voigt, 
who  at  the  last  moment  had  passed  a  sprig  of  laurel 


464  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

through  the  helmet's  decorations.  To  the  poet  this 
ennobling  had  no  meaning ;  he  was  only  glad  that 
Lotte  thereby  recovered  her  nobility,  and  was  made 
free  of  the  court ;  his  children,  too,  might  reap  some 
benefit  from  it.  What  interested  him  more  than  this 
"barren  honour"  was  the  turn  things  were  taking  at 
Eegensburg,  for  his  future  finances  were  involved  in 
it ;  thus  far  the  elector's  cause  had  got  on  very  toler- 
ably, so  that  he  could  do  much  even  as  a  private  man. 
He  was  not  aware  yet  that  Dalberg  had  also  destined 
that  third  of  the  late  elector's  property  which  fell  to 
the  state  for  the  aiding  of  meritorious  artists  and 
scholars.  "  The  main  thing  is  industry,"  he  writes  to 
Kdrner,  "  for  it  not  only  lends  the  means  of  living,  but 
gives  to  life  its  only  value."  And  he  sought  to  train 
his  children  to  it,  though  he  did  not  suppress  their 
youthful  mirth,  and  would  rather  be  disturbed  by 
their  noise  himself,  than  condemn  them  to  sitting  still. 
For  a  couple  of  years  a  young  man  named  Eisert,  who 
taught  Goethe's  August,  had  also  been  giving  Karl  les- 
sons in  Latin,  on  which  Schiller  set  a  high  value.  His 
children  and  Goethe's  boys  were  sworn  comrades ;  they 
had  even  founded  a  small  order  among  themselves, 
whose  badges  they  bestowed  on  some  older  persons 
too.  With  what  thoughtful  care  Schiller  as  a  good 
family  man  calculated  his  resources,  appears  from  his 
setting  them  down  in  his  almanac  for  1802  up  to 
1809  (he  did  not  expect  to  survive  his  fiftieth  year), 
reckoning  one  or  two  new  plays  and  two  volumes  of 
his  collected  dramas  for  each  year,  and  275  or  550 
dollars  in  payments  from  theatres. 

Interrupted  by  frequent  returns  of  his  malady,  he 
now  hoped  at  all  events  to  finish  his  drama  at  the 
beginning  of  February.  At  the  end  of  the  year  Goethe 
was  utterly  disordered,  unstrung,  and  saddened,  es- 
pecially when,  to  his  bitter  sorrow,  a  little  girl  with 
whom    Christiana   presented   him   died    shortly   after 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  465 

birth,  as  three  others  had  done.  Schiller  took  a  warm 
interest  in  his  grief;  indeed,  the  deep  emotion  with 
which  he  spoke  of  his  Christiane's  anguish,  was  the 
first  thing  that  made  Schiller  feel  more  justly  toward 
her.  Goethe,  seeing  himself  also  neglected  by  the 
court,  grew  more  and  more  depressed  about  his  whole 
surroundings,  and  shut  himself  away  from  the  outer 
world.  Schnier  almost  alone  had  access;  he  found 
him  slacker,  less  sympathetic,  nay,  more  reserved,  of 
which  he  httle  divined  the  cause;  he  was  giving 
his  whole  mind  to  the  composition  of  his  "  Natural 
Daughter,"  which  he  felt  bound  to  keep  a  secret  even 
from  Schiller ;  and  that  very  circumstance  was  a  load 
on  his  mind.  And  then  for  a  week  he  lay  dangerously 
ill  with  inflammation  of  the  lungs.  Though  Schiller 
during  the  rough  months  of  winter  kept  tolerably 
well  in  body,  he  nevertheless  felt  out  of  tune  and  tone. 
It  gave  him  pleasure  to  receive  on  January  7th  an 
anonymous  remittance  of  650  dollars  from  Frankfort, 
evidently  coming  from  Dalberg,  to  whom  accordingly 
he  expressed  his  thanks.  He  now  purposed  visiting 
his  native  district  in  the  summer,  and  perhaps  even  to 
make  a  pilgrimage  to  the  haunts  of  his  Swiss  hero. 
He  worked  with  great  zest  at  the  tragedy  then  in 
hand,  and  would  have  liked  to  send  it  to  the  elector 
on  his  birthday.  Simultaneously  he  read  some  of  the 
later  French  comedies  at  the  request  of  the  duke,  who 
said  he  would  like  to  see  two  or  three  of  them  adapted 
by  him.  On  February  1st  "The  Bride"  was  finished, 
Schiller  having  at  the  last  moment  decided  to  make 
the  end  a  much  shorter  one.  Three  days  later  he 
read  it  at  his  own  house  before  the  Duke  of  Meinin- 
gen,  whose  birthday  it  was,  and  a  fairly  large  audience, 
when  all  were  much  affected  by  it.  The  Duke  of 
Weimar,  whose  taste  indeed  was  not  flattered  by  the 
piece,  received  a  copy  of  the  MS.  on  the  5th,  and 
Goethe    another,  whom    Schiller  consulted    about  its 


466  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

performance,  particularly  the  naming  of  the  characters 
in  the  chorus.  At  noon  of  the  8th  he  drove  out  with 
his  wife  in  Goethe's  sledge,  and  after  the  concert  they, 
with  their  sister  and  brother-in-law,  who  to  their  joy 
had  at  last  returned  to  Weimar,  were  at  Goethe's  to 
supper.  On  the  11th  he  read  the  piece  to  the 
duchess,  and  sent  it  to  the  elector ;  copies  were  also 
made  out  for  the  theatres  of  Berlin,  Hamburg,  and 
Leipzig.  But  amidst  all  the  cheering  success  of  the 
new  play,  as  well  as  of  the  older  ones,  which  kept 
appearing  in  new  editions  and  had  made  a  conquest 
of  the  stage  ;  in  spite  of  handsome  payments  by  pub- 
lishers and  managers,  and  in  spite  of  Goethe's  friendly 
sympathy,  Schiller  felt  irritated  and  depressed.  Writ- 
ing on  February  17th  to  announce  the  completion  of 
his  piece  to  Humboldt,  who  was  gone  as  ambassador 
to  Rome,  and  whom  he  had  seen  at  Weimar  for  three 
days  in  October,  he  complains  of  Goethe's  aimless 
dawdling,  that  he  takes  up  everything  by  turns  and 
never  concentrates  himself  vigorously  on  anything, 
that  he  makes  a  perfect  monk  of  himself.  Nay,  to 
our  astonishment  we  read :  "  If  Goethe  had  any  faith 
left  in  the  possibility  of  something  good  being  done, 
and  any  continuity  in  what  he  does,  many  things 
might  yet  be  realised  here  at  Weimar,  both  in  Art 
generally  and  in  the  dramatic  hue.  At  all  events, 
something  might  spring  into  existence,  and  this  dreary 
state  of  block  be  broken  up.  Alone,  I  can  do  nothing ; 
I  often  feel  impelled  to  look  round  the  world  for  some 
other  seat  and  sphere  of  action ;  if  there  were  a  toler- 
able place  anywhere,  I  would  go."  Happily  this  ill 
temper  did  not  last  long  (even  before  the  letter  was 
despatched,  on  March  3d,  he  acknowledged  that  it  was 
WTitten  in  a  melancholy  mood) ;  but  tlie  longing  for  a 
wider  sphere  of  action  kept  often  rising  in  him  still. 
Then  the  condition  of  German  literature  looked  to  him 
most  deplorable ;  the  pubhc  wavered  between  the  Tieck 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  467 

and  Schlegel  school,  which  daily  grew  more  hollow  and 
fantastic,  and  their  matter-of-fact  opponents,  who  got 
increasingly  dull  and  contemptible. 

When  Kotzebue  had  made  one  good  last  effort  to 
wean  the  court  from  Goethe,  and  had  roused  against 
him  the  artists  of  Berlin,  he  removed  to  that  capital, 
so  hostile  to  the  Ideal  tendency,  where,  on  January 
27th,  as  the  most  famous  German  poet,  he  was  named 
full  member  of  the  Academy  of  Sciences,  whose  doors 
were  closed  to  Schiller  and  Goethe.  His  dignity  was 
quickly  trumpeted  in  the  journal  he  had  started  at 
the  beginning  of  the  year,  the  Freimiithige,  "  a  Berlin 
newspaper  for  educated  and  unprejudiced  readers." 
The  new  periodical  assumed  the  most  flippant  airs 
toward  Goethe,  as  one  who  had  made  himself  the  con- 
necting link  between  poets  and  poetasters,  and  who, 
by  his  want  of  modesty  and  respect  for  the  pubhc  and 
his  own  good  name,  had  missed  his  high  vocation  as 
the  first  of  German  writers.  His  management  of  the 
Weimar  theatre  and  his  worshippers,  the  Eomanticists, 
were  attacked  in  the  most  vulgar  way,  and  Wieland, 
Klopstock,  Engel,  and  others  were  set  up  against  him 
as  the  pride  of  Germany.  Schiller's  former  friend, 
Huber,  amongst  others,  had  joined  the  Freimiithige,  but 
his  articles  were  distinguished  by  taste,  judgment,  and 
just  appreciation.  Merkel  struck  the  same  note  of 
arrogance  in  his  journal  Ernst  und  Sclierz.  If  Schiller 
was  not  fiercely  persecuted,  he  was  treated  coldly,  and 
denied  the  possession  of  genius  as  much  as  by  the 
Romanticists.  In  free  and  bright  moments  he  could 
easily  set  himself  above  it  all,  as  his  shining  successes 
stood  so  clear  in  the  light  of  day,  and  he  felt  himself 
raised  high  above  the  presumptuous  critics  and  their 
l^roteges ;  nevertheless,  their  impudent  opposition  deeply 
galled  him. 

While  diligently  conducting  the  rehearsals  of  "  The 
Bride,"  he  was  seized  with  a  passing  inchnation  to 


468  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

work  on  at  his  "Knights  of  Malta."  On  March  19th 
the  new  drama  came  on  the  boards  with  great  effect. 
Schiller  thought  he  had  never  before  taken  in  the 
impression  of  a  true  tragedy.  Goethe  felt  the  floor  of 
the  theatre  consecrated  by  it  to  something  higher. 
That  many  people  could  not  at  once  lay  aside  their 
prosaic  craving  for  the  Natural,  troubled  the  poets  not 
at  all.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  play,  the  son  of 
Professor  Schiitz  of  Jena,  by  previous  concert  with  a 
large  number  of  other  students  who  had  come  over 
from  the  university,  raised  a  hurrah  for  Schiller,  in 
which  the  spectators  enthusiastically  joined.  Un- 
fortunately, Goethe  could  not  let  such  a  violation  of 
standing  rules  pass  unrebuked,  and  the  commandant 
of  Jena  received  orders  to  make  known  in  the  proper 
quarter  the  official  displeasure  at  the  noisy  ovation. 
By  this  time  the  actors'  parts  for  a  performance  of 
the  "  Jungfrau  "  were  written  out.  At  the  same  time 
Goethe  was  holding  at  his  own  house  rehearsals  of  his 
"  Natural  Daughter,"  of  which  until  its  performance 
not  even  his  truest  ally  was  told  more  than  the  title 
and  the  unnamed  characters  that  appear  in  it.  Schiller 
had  contracted  a  violent  sciatica  during  a  visit  at  the 
castle.  On  the  31st  we  still  learn  from  his  wife  that 
he  is  affected  by  the  severe  winter,  "galled  by  the 
circumstances  in  which  his  friends  are  placed,  and  not 
yet  quite  comfortable  again  in  his  mental  condition." 
It  is  true,  Lotte  herself  was  so  out  of  humour,  that 
she  could  see  nothing  to  please  her  anywhere,  and 
this  heightened  Schiller's  depression.  "  My  noisy 
family  that  every  now  and  then  disturbs  me  in  my 
ideal  fancies,  the  home  of  my  feelings,  does  not  always 
tend  to  make  those  fancies  happy."  This  is  what  she 
confides  to  Fritz  von  Stein.  The  performance  of  "  The 
Natural  Daughter,"  on  April  2d,  made  a  profound 
impression  on  Schiller.  Finding  himself  still  incapable 
of  any  dramatic  composition,  he  set  to  work  at  trans- 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  469 

lating  French  comedies.  Then,  also,  favoured  by  the 
spring,  he  attempted  something  lyric  again,  among 
other  things  his  "  Eudolf  von  Habsburg,"  which  he 
finished  on  April  25th.  Two  days  before,  every  one 
had  been  electrified  by  the  first  performance  of  the 
"  Jungfrau,"  on  whose  rehearsals  he  had  bestowed 
uncommon  care.  As  Cotta  was  passing  through  to 
Leipzig  on  the  26th,  Schiller  gave  him  a  punch  supper 
at  the  town  hall,  intending  on  his  return  to  travel  to 
Suabia  with  him.  He  felt  so  well  that  on  the  30th 
he  accepted  an  invitation  from  the  officers  at  Erfurt, 
which  had  been  occupied  by  Prussia  from  the  year 
before.  "  It  was  gi'eat  fun  to  me,"  he  writes  to  Korner, 
"  to  be  set  down  among  such  a  lot  of  the  mihtary ; 
there  were  about  one  hundred  officers  together,  of 
whom  the  old  majors  and  colonels  who  had  seen 
service  interested  me  most." 

Two  French  comedies  were  ready  by  May  7th ;  one, 
"  The  Nephew  as  Uncle,"  was  immediately  studied,  and 
by  the  18th  the  pubhc  were  laughing  over  it.  Goethe, 
before  going  to  Jena  on  the  13th,  had  agreed  with 
Schiller  about  managing  the  theatre  in  his  absence. 
On  Cotta's  return  both  Schiller  and  Lotte  were  unwell, 
and  gave  up  the  thought  of  accompanying  him  to 
Suabia,  but  they  held  out  hopes  of  their  going  in  the 
course  of  the  summer,  when  he  would  come  as  far  as 
Heidelberg  to  meet  them.  For  the  moment  Schiller 
threw  himself  with  ardour  into  his  preface  to  "  The 
Bride,"  where  he  wished  to  utter  his  views  on  the 
use  of  the  Chorus  in  Tragedy.  In  it  he  declared 
emphatically  against  the  common  view  of  the  Natural, 
which  would  simply  abolish  and  annihilate  all  poetry. 
It  was  not  the  public  that  lowered  Art,  but  the  artists ; 
these  should  see  the  worthiest  as  a  goal  before  them, 
should  aim  at  an  Ideal ;  let  executive  art  then  suit 
itself  to  the  circumstances  as  it  may.  It  was  a  mani- 
festo against  the  Kotzebue  tendency,  whose  productions 


470  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

even  the  "VVeimar  stage  could  uot  exclude.  Schiller 
fiuished  for  Cotta's  Annual  "  The  Feast  of  Victory," 
which  he  had  begun  early  in  the  preceding  year. 
The  second  part  of  his  "  Poems "  came  out  a  little 
before,  in  which  only  two  or  three  are  new,  the 
majority  being  of  the  youthful  period,  though  some 
are  altered  and  considerably  shortened.  The  continued 
sale  of  these  "  wild  products  of  youthful  Dilettantism  " 
he  excuses  by  saying  they  had  "  become  a  prescriptive 
possession  of  the  reader,"  and  "  even  the  faulty  in 
them  was  at  all  events  a  step  in  the  author's  mental 
growth."  How  unjustly  he  had  condemned  the  same 
proceeding  in  Burger!  At  the  beginning  of  June  he 
was  a  good  deal  with  Zelter,  then  staying  at  Goethe's, 
whose  ballads  and  song-melodies,  delivered  by  him 
expressively,  simply,  and  touchingly,  though  in  a  some- 
what broken  voice,  Schiller  thought  excellent.  He 
gave  him  some  of  his  poems  to  take  with  him,  and 
commended  him  to  Korner  as  a  man  of  culture  and 
solid  grain  and  grit,  such  as  are  seldom  to  be  found. 
He  felt  so  well  at  that  time  that  he  even  appeared  at 
court  once,  ha\dng  got  a  uniform  made  for  the  occa- 
sion ;  till  then  he  had  only  attended  at  the  birthdays 
of  the  duchess  and  the  hereditary  prince.  All  his 
thoughts  were  now  turned  upon  "  Tell." 

But  Goethe  drove  him  to  Lauchstadt,  where  he  had 
been  so  eagerly  expected  the  year  before,  especially  by 
the  young  students.  His  stay  at  that  cheerful  and 
to  him  memorable  watering-place,  from  the  2d  to  the 
14th  July,  was  as  exciting  as  it  was  agreeable.  His 
rooms  there  were  on  a  ground  floor  looking  on  to  a 
garden.  Students  from  Halle  and  Leipzig,  drawn  to 
Lauchstadt  by  the  performance  of  his  "  Bride,"  sang 
him  a  serenade,  and  in  the  morning  gi-eeted  him  with 
music.  The  representation  of  the  play  was  disturbed, 
but  its  effect  partly  heightened,  by  a  thunder-storm. 
On  the  11th  the  "  Jungfrau  "  was  given.     Previously, 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  471 

ou  the  6th,  Schiller  had  written :  "  The  sight  of  a  new 
public  has  given  me  many  new  ghmpses  into  theatrical 
matters,  and  I  feel  pretty  sure  that  in  future  I  shall 
write  much  more  definitely  and  suitably  for  the  theatre, 
without  in  the  slightest  sacrificing  the  poetry."  He 
also  gathered  more  confidence  in  his  health,  since  he 
could  feel  so  easy  and  happy  amidst  a  great,  bustling 
crowd.  The  Prince  of  Wiirtemburg,  who  was  there, 
showed  him  great  cordiality.  But  idleness  could  never 
please  him  for  long,  and  he  must  needs  be  gone,  though 
he  first  accepted  for  a  day  an  invitation  to  Halle  from 
Eektor  Niemeyer. 

The  moving  of  the  ducal  family  into  their  new  castle 
on  August  1st  threw  all  Weimar  into  commotion. 
Schiller  could  not  keep  out  of  the  festivities,  and  had 
to  present  himself  at  the  court  levee  every  Sunday. 
On  the  6th  he  for  once  visited  Jena,  where  his  garden- 
house  had  long  ago  been  sold  to  Professor  Thibaut. 
Alas !  the  university  there  was  all  on  the  decline,  as 
the  most  eminent  professors  were  tempted  away  by 
more  brilliant  offers.  He  on  this  occasion  spoke  to 
Paulus,  who  had  likewise  received  a  call,  and  found 
him  not  disinclined  to  remain  if  his  salary  were  raised. 
Goethe  did  all  in  his  power  to  remedy  the  evil,  though 
he  saw  very  well  that  with  such  limited  resources 
little  could  be  done.  But  when  the  news  got  about 
that  even  the  Literatur  Zeitung,  so  bound  up  with  the 
university's  life,  was  about  to  remove  to  Halle  with 
Schiitz,  he  resolved  with  all  his  might  to  save  it  for 
Jena ;  let  them  set  up  a  new  one  at  Halle  if  they 
pleased.  In  the  first  place  he  obtained  a  patent  for  a 
company  to  be  formed  with  that  object.  The  man 
chosen  for  editor,  Professor  Eichstadt,  handed  him  on 
the  27th  a  prospectus,  on  reading  which  Goethe  hurried 
off  to  Schiller's  in  the  evening,  to  persuade  him  to 
cooperate.  He  there  found  Frau  von  Stein,  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  von  Helvig  and  his  young  wife,  the  authoress 


472  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

of  "  The  Lesbian  Sisters,"  seated  at  tea,  but  his  business 
was  so  pressing  that  he  could  not  join  the  company ; 
he  drew  his  friend  into  a  side-room,  wliere  they  stood 
and  discussed  the  matter  over  a  bottle  of  wine.  Schil- 
ler in  a  sanguine  mood  promised  his  help,  though  he 
had  begun  his  "  Tell "  two  days  before,  in  which  he 
hoped  to  give  the  world  an  altogether  unique  national 
drama,  in  sympathy  with  all  the  liberal  tendencies  of 
the  age.  A  few  days  later  the  King  of  Sweden,  who 
was  passing  through,  spoke  to  him  at  court,  thanked 
him  for  his  "  History  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,"  in 
which  he  had  shed  such  lustre  on  the  Swedish  names, 
and  presented  him  with  a  costly  ring  set  in  brilliants. 

Early  in  September  arrived  the  tidings  so  momentous 
to  Weimar  of  the  happily  accomplished  betrothal  of 
the  hereditary  prince  to  the  Kussian  grand  duchess. 
When  Wolzogen  informed  him  that  the  empress  had 
begged  of  him  "  The  Bride  of  Messina,"  Schiller  an- 
swered that  it  would  be  a  great  spur  to  him  in  doing 
"  Tell,"  to  think  that  he  could  have  it  acted  for  the 
first  time  in  the  presence  of  the  prince  and  grand 
duchess,  whose  advent  was  expected  in  the  spring. 
All  absorbed  in  his  theme,  which  compelled  him  to 
get  an  accurate  knowledge  of  the  Swiss  land  and  nation, 
he  thus  expressed  himself  to  Korner :  "  If  the  gods 
grant  me  to  put  into  shape  what  I  have  in  my  head,  it 
shall  be  a  thing  of  might,  and  shake  the  theatres  of 
Germany."  A  representation  of  Shakespeare's  "  Julius 
Caesar"  on  October  1st  had  an  inspiring  effect.  When 
Schiller  was  at  Jena  from  the  2d  to  the  7th,  he  called 
on  Voss,  who  took  a  gi'eat  interest  in  him  as  a  man, 
though  he  could  not  swallow  his  plays.  The  hours  of 
dehghtful  talk  they  then  had  with  Schiller  were  always 
remembered  with  peculiar  pleasure  by  Ernestine  Voss. 
While  at  Jena  he  allowed  himself  to  be  prejudiced 
against  Goethe's  new  Literatitr  Zeitung :  he  even 
thought  they  had  gone  the  wrong  way  to  work,  that 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  473 

nothing  could  come  of  it,  and  he  did  not  want  to  have 
much  to  do  with  the  paper.  He  cared  more  for  the  in- 
terests of  the  university.  He  writes  :  "  I  have  not  been 
altogether  idle  about  moving  our  ministry  and  the  duke 
to  more  decided  steps,  but  there  is  an  evil  spirit  haunts 
the  house  here,  and  thwarts  every  good  measure." 
More  ardent  champions  than  Goethe  and  Voigt  the  uni- 
versity could  not  have,  but  the  duke  had  long  been 
against  it,  because  it  had  too  small  means  and  too 
many  masters,  and  nobody  would  guarantee  its  future. 
Schiller  himself  had  spoken  to  the  duke  on  behalf 
of  Paulus,  and  had  been  authorised  to  offer  him  an 
additional  two  hundred  thalers  and  some  other  privi- 
leges ;  but  he  had  not  succeeded  in  keeping  him  either. 
Personally,  Schiller  was  delighted  to  receive  620  thalers 
sent  anonymously  from  Regensburg,  which  was  Dal- 
berg's  response  to  the  account  he  had  sent  him  a  few 
days  before  of  his  new  play.  It  was  clear  to  him  now 
that  his  patron  would  not  bind  himself  to  anything 
definite,  but  would  only  assist  him  from  time  to  time ; 
he  therefore  made  a  point  of  keeping  up  his  connection 
with  him.  At  the  same  time  he  looked  hopefully  to 
the  future  hereditary  princess,  having  to  his  great  joy 
heard  from  Wolzogen  that  the  Russian  empress  and 
her  daughter  had  listened  with  high  approval  to  the 
reading  of  his  dramas.  "  TeU,"  it  is  true,  made  slow 
progress ;  not  only  did  the  subject  demand  the  most 
minute  acquaintance  with  a  country  and  a  people  he 
had  never  seen,  but  the  time  of  year  was  much  against 
him.  The  cordial  reception  of  his  adaptation  of  "  The 
Parasite  "  on  the  stage  pleased  him  much,  especially  as 
he  had  obliged  the  duke  by  it.  Kotzebue  by  this  time 
was  gone  from  Berlin,  but  not  until  he  had  thrown  off 
a  sorry  skit  against  Goethe,  under  the  name  of  "  Expec- 
torations," which,  with  his  usual  honesty,  he  afterward 
disclaimed.  Merkel  carried  on  the  Freimiithige,  to 
which  its  founder  still  contributed  largely ;    Schiller 


474  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

was  now  set  by  the  side  of  Wieland,  Klopstock,  and 
Herder,  against  Goethe  ;  the  "  Oberons  "  and  "  Messiads  " 
were  cried  up,  and  the  erusade  against  Goethe  was 
continued  with  equal  mahce,  flippancy,  and  infatuation. 

When  he,  whose  vigorous  interposition  on  behalf  of 
the  Literatur  Zcitung  was  making  its  prospects  look 
more  and  more  encouraging,  went  to  Jena  on  the  same 
business  to  stay  some  time,  Schiller  felt  the  more 
lonely,  as  his  sister  and  brother-in-law  were  also  away. 
He  seldom  went  to  the  Sunday  levees  at  court,  and  sel- 
domer  still  accepted  invitations  from  the  dowager  duch- 
ess, though  he  prized  her  now  as  a  "  right  noble  woman." 
He  was  much  in  earnest  about  the  education  of  his  two 
boys.  It  was  arranged  that  they  should  now  be  under 
Eisert  five  or  six  hours  a  day  ;  Karl  was  to  do  geometry 
and  natural  history  in  addition  to  Latin,  while  Ernst, 
in  whom  Lotte  then  thought  she  could  see  a  poetic 
bias,  went  on  with  his  reading  and  writing. 

When  it  was  rumoured  that  Madame  de  Stael,  on  her 
way  to  BerHn,  would  pay  a  visit  to  the  Court  of  the 
Muses  at  Weimar,  Schiller  thought  that  if  only  she 
understood  German,  they  might  well  be  a  match  for 
her  ;  but  it  was  too  much  to  expect  of  them  to  expound 
to  her  in  French  phrases  the  faith  that  was  in  them, 
and  hold  their  own  against  her  French  volubility. 
Goethe  declared  he  could  not  get  away  from  Jena,  and 
begged  Schiller  to  represent  him.  On  December  14th 
came  Necker's  gifted  daughter,  about  whom  all  minds 
were  on  the  stretch ;  and  the  following  day  she  dined 
at  court.  In  the  evening  Schiller  and  his  wife  came  in 
to  tea  and  supper.  She  was  much  surprised  when  the 
tall  man  in  court-dress  was  presented  to  her  as  Schil- 
ler; she  would  sooner  have  taken  him  for  a  general. 
They  were  soon  involved  in  a  warm  philosophical 
debate,  which  Schiller  could  not  battle  out  for  want 
of  fluency  in  French.  He  and  Wieland  called  the  next 
morning  on  the  ready-witted  lady,  and  met  her  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  475 

same  evening  at  the  dowager  duchess's.  Schiller 
found  her  exactly  what  he  had  imagined  her,  without 
a  spark  of  poetry  or  of  ideality,  and  yet  her  clearness, 
decision,  and  nimble  play  of  wit  did  one  a  world  of 
good,  only  her  extraordinary  ghbness  of  tongue  de- 
manded the  most  unflagging  attention.  However,  he 
gave  not  an  inch  of  ground  to  the  arrogating  French- 
woman, who  fancied  she  possessed  the  only  true  taste. 
At  last  Goethe  made  up  his  mind  to  come  to  Weimar 
after  all.  He  wrote  from  Jena  inviting  Madame  de 
Stael  and  Schiller  and  his  wife  to  dinner  at  his  house 
on  the  24th.  He  also,  with  all  due  politeness,  adroitly 
managed  to  keep  at  a  distance  the  Frenchwoman's 
exacting  importunities ;  he  went  to  see  her  the  next 
day,  but  after  that  he  declared  himself  too  unwell  to 
receive  strange  visitors.  All  the  more  had  Schiller  to 
contribute  to  the  entertainment  of  this  inquisitive 
woman  with  her  endless  questions,  whose  presence  was 
baneful  enough  to  him  at  a  time  when  he  wished  to 
work  wholly  at  his  "  Tell,"  yet  whom  he  admired  for 
her  intellect  and  her  rare  eloquence.  On  January  7th, 
1804,  he  was  at  a  dinner  given  by  Madame  de  Stael  to 
the  "  Literary  Men "  of  Weimar,  among  whom  were 
Wieland  and  the  fawning  Bottiger,  a  worthy  confederate 
of  Kotzebue  and  Merkel.  She  had  always  the  same 
way  with  her  —  that  insatiable  craving  to  display  her 
wit,  to  amend  the  German  want  of  taste,  and  to  widen 
her  knowledge  and  understanding  of  the  world  ;  and  all 
the  while,  anything  strange  to  her  she  quietly  set  aside 
as  not  to  the  purpose.  An  utter  absence,  too,  of  femi- 
nine reserve  gave  one  a  disagreeable  shock.  On  the 
12th  she  was  at  Schiller's,  who,  in  spite  of  all  hin- 
drances and  the  care  he  had  to  bestow  on  rehearsals, 
was  able  on  the  13th  to  send  Goethe  the  first  act  of  his 
"  Tell."  His  friend's  approval  gave  him  great  comfort, 
of  which  he  stood  in  special  need  "  in  the  present  suf- 
focating air."     Alas !  Madame  de  Stael  threatened  to 


476  THE   LI-FE   OF  SCHILLER 

stay  another  three  weeks.  Directly  after  that  Schiller 
had  to  keep  his  house  for  a  couple  of  days,  yet  he  was 
able  to  conduct  the  trial-reading  for  Bode's  adaptation 
of  Eacine's  "  Mithridates,"  which  for  want  of  something 
better  was  to  be  played  on  the  duchess's  birthday.  In 
spite  of  the  more  and  more  conspicuous  "  hollowness, 
halfness,  woodenness "  of  the  whole  style,  he  had  to 
carry  it  through  somehow.  Immediately  after  he 
pleased  Goethe  amazingly  with  the  second  act  of  his 
"  Tell."  Having  promised  IfHand  the  play  for  the  end 
of  February,  he  worked  sturdily  on,  though  the  pres- 
ence of  JMadame  de  Stael,  who  would  keep  on  discus- 
sing all  things  with  Trench  superficiality,  gi-ew  daily 
more  oppressive. 

It  was  a  great  -joy  to  him  to  make  the  acquaintance 
of  the  historian  of  Switzerland,  Johannes  von  Miiller, 
who  was  travelling  to  Berlin,  but  who  stayed  at 
Weimar  from  January  22d  to  February  7th.  About 
the  same  time  Voss  came  to  Weimar  to  promote  the 
appointment  of  his  son  Heinrich,  aged  then  twenty- 
four,  to  the  Gymnasium.  Toward  this  young  man 
especially,  who  from  the  10th  stayed  more  than  a 
week  at  Goethe's,  a  cordial  attachment  was  formed  by 
both  the  poets.  On  the  16th  Schiller  felt  obliged  to 
decline  the  invitation  to  a  supper  given  by  Goethe 
to  Madame  de  Stael  and  her  friend  Benjamin  Constant 
(who  knew  German  well),  because  he  had  carefully  to 
guard  against  everything  that  might  dispel  or  darken 
the  happy  mood  he  needed  at  the  last,  and  particularly 
against  French  friends.  In  two  days  more  he  sent 
Goethe  the  entire  play,  with  a  distribution  of  the 
parts,  for  the  Weimar  theatre ;  but  the  stress  of  work 
and  the  weather  had  so  affected  him  that  for  a  few 
days  he  had  to  keep  at  home.  On  the  20th  he  sent 
the  concluding  part  of  "  Tell "  to  Iffland  ;  the  next  day 
he  mixed  in  society  again,  and  the  evening  after  supped 
at  Madame  de  Stael's  with  Goethe  and  Constant.     At 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  477 

last,  on  the  29th,  this  singular  woman  went  on  her 
way  to  Berhu.  Schiller,  writing  to  introduce  her  to 
Iffland,  says :  "  Though  we  plain  Germans  are  radically 
and  hopelessly  at  variance  with  her  French  way  of 
thinking,  yet  she  judges  more  worthily  of  the  German 
genius  than  any  of  her  countrymen,  and  has  an  earnest, 
even  passionate,  striving  toward  the  good  and  right." 

The  first  reading-rehearsal  of  "  Tell "  was  held  at 
Goethe's  house  on  March  1st,  the  next  on  the  6th ; 
the  first  two  acts  were  tried  at  the  theatre  on  the  8th, 
the  last  three  on  the  9th.  And  the  very  next  day 
Schiller  resolved  on  a  new  drama,  "  Demetrius ;  or. 
The  Bloody  Bridal  of  Moscow."  He  had  once  before, 
in  "  Warbeck,"  selected  a  false  Pretender  for  dramatic 
handling ;  but  having  lately,  in  view  of  the  shortly 
expected  grand  duchess,  looked  about  for  a  subject  in 
Eussian  history,  he  had  found  it  in  the  history  of  the 
false  Demetrius,  which  now,  on  closer  inspection,  he 
thought  extremely  suitable  for  a  gi-and  play.  On 
March  17th  his  "  Tell "  came  on  the  stage,  and  pro- 
duced even  a  greater  effect  than  any  of  his  former 
dramas.  He  felt,  so  he  wrote  to  Kcirner,  that  he  was 
gradually  getting  to  be  master  of  theatrical  matters. 
Thus  he  struggled  toward  higher  and  higher  perfection 
in  art,  while  his  rival,  of  whose  "  Hussites  "  the  Weimar 
theatre  had  lately  given  a  most  finished  performance, 
only  aimed  at  coarse  effects,  and  at  distancing  all  that 
had  been  done.  The  new  play  was  repeated  on  the 
19th  and  24th  with  the  same  success.  And  yet 
Schiller  found  himself  in  a  bitter  mood.  On  the  20th 
he  wrote  to  his  brother-in-law  Wolzogen,  at  Petersburg, 
that  Weimar  pleased  him  worse  every  day ;  anywhere 
was  better  than  there ;  if  his  health  allowed  it,  he 
would  joyfully  move  to  the  north.  He  adds :  "  My 
occupation  is  my  dearest  delight ;  it  makes  me  happy 
in  myself  and  outwardly  independent ;  and  if  I  can 
only  reach  my  fiftieth  year  with  mental  powers  unim- 


478  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

paired,  I  hope  to  save  euough  to  make  my  children 
independent.  This  year  I  get  my  house  clear  of  debt, 
and  look  to  have  something  over  as  well."  A  melan- 
choly that  sometimes  seized  him  inspired  these  words, 
though  he  might  fairly  count  upon  the  grand  duchess, 
who  was  expected  soon,  for  an  improvement  in  his 
circumstances ;  and  he  stood  on  the  most  intimate 
footing  with  the  three  most  eminent  councillors  of  the 
duke,  with  the  duke  himself,  and  the  court.  What 
oppressed  him  was,  that  he  had  not  a  free  sphere  of 
action,  that  he  was  Httle  better  than  a  pensioner ;  his 
spirit  longed  for  hving  activity,  on  a  wider  scene  than 
Weimar,  with  its  limited  means,  could  be.  His  whole 
heart  was  fixed  upon  this,  and  on  his  art.  The  political 
world  troubled  him  not ;  what  was  there  to  be  had 
from  it,  when  in  France,  mighty  France  that  ruled  the 
world,  and  that  had  shattered  the  German  Empire,  an 
omnipotent  despotic  Imperiahsm  was  coming  on ! 


CHAPTER  IV. 

FROM  APRIL,  1804,  TO  MAY,  1805. 

But  few  gleams  of  light  brightened  the  brief  remain- 
der of  life  allotted  to  our  poet.  At  Berlin  he  met  with 
a  brilliant  reception,  and  had  flattering  offers  made 
him ;  at  Weimar  he  was  happy  in  the  favour  of  the 
grand  duchess,  who  captivated  all ;  but  a  cold  which 
he  caught  a  little  before  Lotte's  last  confinement  shook 
his  long-enfeebled  health  to  its  foundations ;  and  he 
was  never  well  again.  At  times,  indeed,  he  roused 
himself  up,  but  his  love  of  life  and  the  overexertion 
increased  his  weakness  and  provoked  ever-renewed 
attacks,  which  at  last  overpowered  him. 

In  the  early  part  of  April,  while  his  wife  and  chil- 
dren suffered  from  whooping-cough,  he  was  tolerably 
well  himself ;  he  could  go  to  court  and  to  parties,  and 
his  "  Demetrius  "  was  well  in  train.  When  it  became 
apparent  that  in  August  Lotte  would  present  him  with 
another  child,  he  resolved  to  undertake  no  journey 
that  year,  but  to  work  the  more  steadily,  that  he  might 
the  sooner  begin  to  pay  off  by  degrees  the  debt  he 
owed  to  Korner.  But  when  Pauli,  secretary  to  the 
Berlin  theatre,  whom  Iffland  had  sent  to  him  about 
some  needful  alterations  m  "  Tell,"  opened  to  him  the 
prospect  of  a  call  to  the  same  theatre,  Schiller,  after 
sending  his  "  Tell "  to  the  arch-chancellor,  with  a 
couple  of  stanzas  to  guard  against  misconstruction  of 
the  play,  set  out  on  the  26th  with  Lotte  and  the  boys 
for  the  Prussian  capital.     At  Leipzig  he  passed  two  or 

479 


480  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

three  delightful  days  with  Cotta  and  his  wife;  the 
faithful  old  friend  showed  his  kindness  in  ways  that 
touched  him.  At  noon  of  May  1st  they  arrived  at  Ber- 
lin, and  put  up  at  the  large  HOtel  de  Kussie.  Ifflaud, 
Hufeland,  Zelter,  the  Von  Hagen  family,  linger, 
Fichte,  and  others,  vied  with  one  another  to  make  his 
stay  a  pleasant  one.  He  called  on  Henriette  Herz,  a 
friend  of  Frau  von  Wolzogen  and  of  Humboldt.  She 
thought  the  poet  quite  a  man  of  the  world,  he  was  so 
particularly  cautious  in  expressing  opinions  on  persons. 
Though  his  pale  complexion  and  reddish  hair  (she 
informs  us)  took  away  from  the  noble  effect  of  his 
features,  all  that  disappeared  when  in  hvely  conversa- 
tion ;  a  faint  blush  came  into  his  cheeks,  and  enhanced 
the  brilliance  of  his  blue  eyes.  At  the  performance  of 
his  "  Bride,"  on  the  4th,  his  entrance  into  the  box  was 
hailed  again  and  again  with  shouts  of  joy.  He  supped 
the  next  day  with  the  fiery  German-hearted  Prince 
Louis  Ferdinand.  For  a  time  he  was  ill  tlirough  over- 
excitement,  but  on  the  12th  he  could  dine  at  Hufe- 
land's  and  was  present  the  same  evening  at  a  splendid 
performance  of  his  "  Maid."  He  had  access  to  the 
court  also:  on  the  13th  he  was  received  by  the  queen. 
The  boys  met  the  two  eldest  princes,  and  the  crown 
prince  struck  up  a  friendship  with  Karl,  who  was  two 
years  older.  On  the  14th  Schiller  saw  "  Wallenstein's 
Death,"  and  the  following  evening  went  to  Zelter's 
singing-school.  The  splendour  and  rich  resources  of 
the  Berlin  stage  strongly  attracted  the  dramatic  poet, 
and  though  the  naturalism  prevailing  here,  in  contrast 
with  Weimar,  could  not  delight  him,  he  was  too  wise  to 
utter  a  single  disagreeable  word.  This  much  is  said 
to  have  been  elicited  from  Lotte  in  an  underhand  way, 
that  the  player  of  Thekla  was  not  to  his  taste.  Iftland 
gave  the  poet  delightful  fetes  at  his  charming  garden 
residence  in  the  Thiergarten-strasse,  but  he  had  to 
leave  for  Hanover  on  the  16th,  and  he  informed  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  481 

Cabinet  Privy  Councillor  von  Beyme  at  Potsdam  that 
Schiller,  hearing  from  Pauh  that  they  would  like  to 
get  him  to  Berhn,  had  remarked  that  in  that  case  they 
must  procure  him  admission  at  Potsdam,  or  some  kind 
of  opening.  So  upon  this  Iffland  founded  the  question 
whether  they  could  not  install  him  as  academician 
with  a  salary,  that  he  might  work  for  the  national  stage. 
Schiller  was  equally  prepared  (he  said),  in  case  Miiller, 
who  had  been  appointed  historiographer  and  academi- 
cian, did  not  come,  to  instruct  the  crown  prince  in  his- 
tory. And  he  need  not  break  off  his  connection  with 
Weimar ;  he  might  there  obtain  leave  of  a  few  years' 
residence  at  Berlin  to  secure  a  fortune  for  his  children. 
On  the  morning  of  the  16th  Schiller  drove  to  Potsdam 
in  company  with  Hofrath  Greichen.  He  dined  with 
Beyme,  who  confided  to  him  that  the  king  would  hke 
to  draw  him  to  Berlin,  and  put  him  in  the  position 
most  favourable  to  his  mental  activity ;  let  him  there- 
fore state  in  writing  the  conditions  on  which  he 
thought  he  could  hve  there.  In  the  evening  he  saw 
Kotzebue's  "  Fanchon  "  acted,  and  then  visited  the  hot- 
blooded  Colonel  von  Massenbach ;  the  next  morning 
he  left  Potsdam.  He  was  so  ardent  for  Berlin,  that 
he  utterly  disregarded  his  wife's  objections  to  the  dis- 
mal scenery,  the  (to  her)  disagreeable  tone  and  social 
conditions  of  Berlin.  "  There  is  a  large  personal  free- 
dom there,"  he  states  to  Korner,  "  and  an  unconstrain- 
edness  in  the  civic  life;  music  and  theatre  offer 
manifold  enjoyment,  though  both  are  far  from  being 
worth  what  they  cost.  Besides,  at  Berlin  I  am  more 
likely  to  find  openings  for  my  children ;  and  when 
once  I  am  there,  I  can  go  on  improving  myself  in 
many  ways."  Considering  the  higher  scale  of  prices, 
and  that  in  so  large  a  city  he  must  keep  a  carriage,  he 
thought  he  could  not  make  ends  meet  at  Berlin  with 
less  than  six  hundred  friedrichsd'or ;  he  needed  thir- 
teen hundred  thalers  at  Weimar. 


482  THE   LIFE  OF   SCHILLER 

When  he  got  back  to  Weimar  on  the  21st,  all  the 
advantages  of  the  little  familiar  place  came  vividly 
before  him,  his  obligations  to  the  duke,  the  high  value 
of  his  intercourse  with  Goethe ;  then  again,  his  wife, 
who  looked  forward  anxiously  to  her  confinement, 
could  not  conceal  her  repugnance  to  a  totally  new 
position.  Goethe,  now  restored  to  his  old  serenity,  was 
deeply  interested  in  the  matter ;  and  urged  Schiller  to 
weigh  calmly  the  conditions  on  both  sides ;  he  only 
wished  him  to  take  no  step  until  the  approaching 
return  of  the  duke.  Schiller  also  found  at  Weimar 
the  genial  young  Voss,  who  had  by  this  time  been  in- 
stalled professor  there,  and  who  attached  himself  closely 
to  him  and  to  Goethe.  On  the  28th  he  had  already 
made  up  his  mind  to  remain  at  Weimar,  in  consider- 
ation of  some  substantial  compensation.  During  a 
delightful  four  days'  visit  from  his  sister  Christophine 
with  Eeinwald,  he  made  application  to  the  duke,  who 
kindly  begged  him  to  suggest  the  means  by  which  he 
could  make  his  remaining  at  Weimar  tolerable,  and 
then  at  once  consented  to  the  desired  doubling  of 
his  salary;  nay,  he  even  expressed  a  hope  that  his 
temporary  stay  at  Berlin  might  lead  to  his  receiving 
acceptable  terms  from  there  also.  Not  till  June  18th 
did  Schiller  inform  Beyme  that  he  could  not  leave 
Weimar  altogether,  but  was  prepared  to  live  at  Berlin 
several  months  in  the  year,  for  the  purpose  of  making 
progress  in  his  art,  and  of  having  good  influence  upon 
the  whole  of  the  theatrical  arrangements  there,  which 
a  salary  of  two  thousand  thalers  would  enable  him  to 
do.  To  this  letter  Schiller  Tiever  received  an  answer, 
although  before  the  end  of  the  mouth  the  queen  had 
seen  his  "  Tell "  at  Lauchstadt,  and  praised  it  highly, 
and  he  himself  had  saluted  the  king  at  court-parade  in 
Weimar,  while  his  new  drama  had  been  played  at 
Berlin  in  July  with  such  marked  success  that  even 
the   Freimuthige  spoke  rapturously  of  it.     Meanwhile 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  483 

Dalberg,  the  arch-chancellor,  had  decHned  Schiller's 
dedication  of  it  to  himself  with  the  words  :  "  Let  Schil- 
ler's lofty  Muse  do  homage  to  Virtue,  not  to  mortal 
man ; "  and  had  once  more  signified  his  good-will  by  an 
anonymous  remittance,  this  time  of  1,085  Viennese 
florins. 

Dalberg  was  at  that  time  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of 
Napoleon,  then  risen  to  be  emperor,  and  whose  foot  was 
upon  Germany's  neck.  Feeling  well  and  contented, 
our  poet  set  to  work  at  his  "  Demetrius,"  besides  ar- 
ranging for  the  issue  of  his  poems  in  an  edition  de  luxe, 
and  for  the  printing  of  "Tell."  All  that  disquieted 
him  now  was  Lotte's  expected  confinement.  A  week 
later  he  moved  with  his  family  to  Niethammer's  house 
in  Jena,  where  they  could  be  near  Stark,  the  physi- 
cian. And  here  Fate's  hand  was  upon  him.  Being 
too  thinly  clad,  he  took  cold  after  a  drive  at  evening 
through  the  pleasant  Dornburg  valley.  Attacks  of 
colic  came  on,  and  so  violent  were  they  that  more  than 
once  the  doctor  feared  that  his  patient  could  not  live 
through  them.  While  Schiller  thus  lay  suffering 
agonies  in  the  room  above,  his  wife  below  awaited  her 
hour  of  trial.  On  the  second  day  of  his  sickness,  they 
brought  him  the  new-born  daughter,  to  his  great 
delight.  The  malady  passed  over,  but  his  strength 
would  not  come  back,  and  in  that  sultry  weather  such  a 
seizure  had  been  doubly  weakening  in  its  effect ;  he  felt 
thoroughly  broken  up.  His  complexion  had  grown 
ash-coloured ;  his  fire  and  vivacity  were  gone ;  he 
seemed  far  quieter  and  gentler,  taking  still  a  friendly 
part  in  all  conversation,  and  showing  more  than  ever 
his  love  and  interest  for  the  children.  Besides  his  old 
and  faithful  friends  at  Jena,  whose  society  gladdened 
him,  he  was  especially  pleased  to  meet  good-humoured 
Voss  and  Count  Geszler,  who  had  come  there  solely  on 
his  account.  The  infant  was  baptised  on  the  7th  of 
August,  receiving  the  names  Emilie  Henriette  Louise ; 


484  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

and  among  the  sponsors  were  the  Princesses  Eudolstadt 
and  Sondershauseu,  Count  Geszler,  and  Voss.  Goethe 
arrived  there  to  stay  for  a  few  days,  and  comfort  his 
suffering  friend.  By  the  19th  Schiller  had  gone  back 
to  Weimar,  whither  in  four  days  his  wife  followed 
him ;  both  of  them  were  still  seriously  out  of  health. 
But  at  length,  on  the  11th  of  October,  Schiller  felt 
better  and  could  believe  in  his  recovery. 

"  Inchnation  for  work  and  power  to  do  it  have  come 
back  again,"  he  tells  Korner,  "  and  this  will  help  me  to 
achieve  my  cure ;  for  when  I  can  employ  myself,  I 
always  feel  well."  He  still  thought  over  his  two 
dramatic  themes,  but  without  being  able  to  reach  any 
decision  as  to  them.  Despite  the  cold  from  which  he 
suffered,  he  could  not  bear  to  remain  in  the  house,  but 
went  to  the  court  assemblies  on  Sundays,  and  showed 
himself  in  society  and  at  the  theatre.  There,  for  the 
birthday  of  the  dowager  duchess,  they  had  mounted 
another  Kotzebue  effusion,  his  hideous  "Johanna  von 
Moutfaucon,"  which  should  rival  Schiller's  "  Maid  of 
Orleans."  Voss's  friendship  for  the  poet  grew  ever 
stronger.  When  it  had  to  be  decided  whether  he 
should  join  his  parents  at  Wurzburg,  and  he  seemed 
willing  enough  to  make  this  sacrifice  for  them,  Schiller 
told  him  :  "  No  ;  for  your  parents'  sake  you  ought  to  stop 
on ;  for  if  your  position  at  Wurzburg  failed  to  please 
you,  your  father  will  deeply  rue  having  led  you  to 
take  it." 

Weimar  was  now  eagerly  expecting  the  hereditary 
princess,  whose  wealth,  it  was  hoped,  would  bring  on 
a  golden  age  for  all.  As  Goethe  felt  in  no  mood  for 
writing  poetry,  Schiller  accepted  his  commission  to 
compose  a  "  Prologue  "  for  the  theatre.  This  he  began 
on  the  3d  of  November,  and  by  the  8th,  the  day  before 
the  princess'  coming,  he  had  finished  his  skilfully  con- 
ceived and  skilfully  written  "  Homage  to  the  Arts." 
He  was  presented  to  the  hereditary  princess  at  court, 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  485 

and  thought  her  of  remarkable  cliarm ;  to  the  greatest 
kindhness  she  joined  much  dignity,  which  kept  down 
any  attempt  at  familiarity,  while,  with  all  the  merri- 
ment of  youth,  she  had  a  character  that  was  firm,  and 
a  mind  that  took  interest  in  serious  things,  and  in  all 
that  was  right  and  true.  She  spoke  German  with 
difficulty,  but  she  understood  the  language  perfectly, 
"  Heaven  grant  that  she  do  something  for  the  arts,"  he 
wrote,  "which,  here,  especially  music,  are  in  a  right 
bad  way." 

Wolzogen  had  brought  Schiller  a  costly  diamond 
ring  from  the  empress,  to  whom  he  had  presented  a 
copy  of  the  "  Don  Carlos."  After  a  conversation  with 
the  hereditary  princess,  he  tells  Wolzogen  how  fasci- 
nated he  is :  "I  could  see  her  and  hear  her  speak  ; 
everything  that  she  says  is  full  of  mind  and  soul. 
And  how  fortunate  that  she  understands  German ! 
For  only  in  that  tongue  one  can  show  one's  self  to 
her  just  as  one  is;  and,  with  her,  one  wants  to  be 
thoroughly  sincere."  Next  morning  he  sent  her 
through  Wolzogen  the  MS.  of  his  "  Prologue,"  which 
in  the  evening  she  saw  acted  at  the  theatre ;  and  when 
the  words  were  spoken,  — 

"  Swift  grow  the  links  that  form  Affection's  band ; 
Where  thou  shedd'st  blessing,  there's  thy  Fatherland,"  — 

the  tears  came  into  her  eyes,  as  the  audience  thundered 
its  applause.  Schiller  attended  the  court-ball  on  the 
following  night,  where,  in  gay  company,  he  felt  so 
merry  that,  despite  Lotte's  entreaty,  he  stopped  on 
until  the  small  hours,  returning  at  three  in  the  morn- 
ing amid  the  cheers  of  enthusiastic  friends.  Just  six 
months  later,  at  midnight,  he  was  carried  by  Voss  and 
all  the  flower  of  Weimar  youth,  sadly,  silently,  to  his 
grave. 

Instead  of  nursing  the  cold  from  which  he  suffered, 
Schiller  went  to  the  ball,  the  theatre,  and  the  court. 


486  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

until  at  length  he  was  forced  to  stay  in  the  house  for 
three  weeks.  "  My  health,  alas,  is  so  feeble,"  he  writes 
on  December  10th,  "that  every  spell  of  enjoy juent  has 
at  once  to  be  paid  for  by  weeks  of  suffering  !  And  thus, 
despite  the  best  of  wills,  my  work  is  also  brought  to  a 
halt ! " 

But  he  had  shortened  the  "  Tell,"  leaving  out  the 
whole  of  the  last  act,  as  the  emperor's  murder  could 
not  be  mentioned  before  the  grand  duchess,  who  on 
the  very  eve  of  Napoleon's  coronation  witnessed  this 
splendid  play,  with  its  grand  doctrines  of  freedom. 
Besides  pushing  forward  the  printing  of  the  second 
portion  of  his  "  Poems  "  in  another  edition,  he  urged  on 
the  issue  of  a  first  volume  of  "  Dramas,"  that  Cotta 
years  ago  desired  to  publish,  and  which  was  to  open 
with  the  "  Homage  to  the  Arts."  No  piece  was  forth- 
coming for  the  gala  performance  on  the  duchess's 
birthday,  and  Schiller,  feeling  unfit  for  original  work, 
determined  to  make  an  adaptation  of  Racine's  "  Phedre." 
On  the  17th  he  began  upon  this,  and  in  twenty -six 
days  it  was  ready.  Writing  to  Goethe  on  the  14th, 
who  was  kept  at  home  by  a  cold,  he  says :  "  Alas !  we 
are  all  unwell,  and  he's  the  best  off  who,  perforce,  has 
learned  to  put  up  with  being  sick."  If  not  absolutely 
obhged  to  do  so,  he  could  never  stop  indoors.  The 
"  Demetrius  "  took  up  his  thoughts,  now,  but  if  it  did 
not  succeed,  he  was  going  to  turn  to  some  work  of  a 
mechanical  kind.  It  is  true,  on  the  20th  we  hear  that, 
with  the  thaw,  his  thinking  powers  have  come  back, 
but  still  he  cannot  make  the  effort  to  do  any  work ; 
liis  cold  still  torments  him,  and  well-nigh  crushes  out 
all  vitality.  Shortly  before  this,  the  news  of  Ruber's 
death  on  Christmas  Eve  had  so  shaken  him,  that  he 
dared  not  bring  himself  to  think  of  it.  He  tells 
Korner  that  Huber  "  only  hved  for  us,  and  he  was 
bound  up  with  times  too  beautiful  in  our  life  for  us 
ever  to  think  of  him  with  indifference." 


THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  487 

While  Goethe  was  still  kept  at  home  by  ill  health, 
Schiller  attended  the  theatre  and  directed  the  re- 
hearsals. Wishing  to  gi'atify  the  duke,  he  sent  him 
his  translation  of  "  Phedre,"  and  his  Grace  was  pleased 
at  being  able  to  make  some  remarks  upon  it.  The 
performance,  o\wg  to  the  careful  and  thorough  re- 
hearsals, proved  in  every  way  a  triumph.  But,  alas ! 
there  was  fresh  trouble  in  the  poet's  home  at  this 
time,  for  his  whole  family  had  been  taken  ill  with 
chicken-pox.  He  himself  strove  to  keep  up  his 
strength,  but  on  the  9th  of  February  he  was  pros- 
trate with  fever,  which  two  days  later  again  attacked 
him,  and  its  effects  were  the  more  baneful  on  account 
of  his  weak  and  ailing  state.  Just  before  this  Goethe 
lay  seriously  ill,  and  young  Voss,  their  friend,  watched 
alternately  at  the  iDedside  of  each  of  the  poets.  The 
painful  nature  of  Goethe's  malady  may  have  helped  to 
make  him  somewhat  impatient,  but  Schiller  was  most 
calm,  most  gentle,  always  trying  to  hide  his  suffering, 
so  that  those  about  him,  especially  Lotte,  might  not 
be  distressed ;  he  even  sought  to  cheer  her  by  little 
humourous  speeches,  and  by  making  all  sorts  of  brilliant 
plans  for  the  future.  He  was  delighted  that  Voss  liked 
his  darling  boys ;  true,  they  had  not  a  spark  of  poetry 
in  them ;  as  he  put  it,  they  were  regular  Philistines  by 
nature ;  still,  he  loved  them  passionately  for  all  that. 
By  the  2 2d  Goethe  was  able  to  write  to  him,  and  his 
touching  letter  revived  in  Schiller  the  hope  that  the 
old  times  might  come  back,  though  he  had  often 
despaired  of  this.  Goethe  now  drove  out ;  but  he 
feared  to  visit  his  friend,  as  the  meeting  might  agitate 
them  both  too  highly.  Yet  in  the  first  days  of  March 
Schiller  could  no  longer  restrain  his  longing  for  Goethe, 
to  whom  Voss  was  to  announce  his  coming,  so  that 
the  surprise  might  not  prove  harmful.  And  when  the 
two  sufferers  met,  they  fell  upon  one  another's  neck  and 
spoke,  not  of  all  their  bygone  pain,  but  "  of  sensible 


488  THE   LIFE   OF  SCHILLER 

things,"  as  each  rejoiced  to  possess  the  other  still.  It 
was  a  great  delight  for  Schiller  when  he  was  once  more 
able  to  visit  the  theatre,  for  then  he  gained  fresh  hope 
that  his  life  would  be  spared. 

Goethe  now  suft'ered  from  periodical  attacks  of  his 
disease,  which  brought  him  to  death's  door,  while 
Schiller  for  the  most  part  felt  moderately  well,  and, 
as  before,  went  out  to  the  court  and  the  play.  At  this 
time  a  meeting  with  Mecheln,  the  engraver  and  art 
collector,  gave  him  pleasure.  Mecheln  was  a  native  of 
Switzerland,  and  an  engraving  of  some  Swiss  scenery 
set  them  both  talking  with  zest  of  the  beauties  of  that 
country.  In  the  "  worthy  veteran's  "  album  he  wrote 
two  distichs  where  Nature  and  Art  are  shown  to  be 
exhaustless,  giving  eternal  youth  to  those  who  love 
them.  He  intended  to  make  up  now  for  the  time  lost 
during  that  winter,  and  was  going  to  work  with  greater 
energy  at  the  "  Demetrius,"  which  should  form  a  con- 
trast to  the  "  Maid  of  Orleans."  But  he  never  suc- 
ceeded in  doing  this.  On  March  27th  he  tells  Goethe, 
whom,  owing  to  the  bitter  north  winds,  he  had  not 
seen  for  some  considerable  time,  that  at  last  he  had 
buckled  to  his  work  in  thorough  earnest,  and  that  he 
did  not  believe  he  would  be  easily  led  away  from  it. 
On  the  2d  of  April  he  writes  three  letters  to  Eome, 
which  are  carried  tliither  by  a  traveller  going  to  Italy ; 
one  of  these  was  to  Humboldt,  the  last  he  ever  sent. 
He  confessed  that  in  "  Tell "  and  the  "  Maid  of  Orleans  " 
he  had  perhaps  conceded  somewhat  to  the  demands  of 
the  world  and  of  the  present  epoch,  and  while  making 
a  sensation  with  his  plays  at  all  the  German  theatres, 
he  had  from  these  theatres  also  gained  knowledge  and 
experience.  As  he  had  made  good  contracts  with 
Cotta  and  the  managers,  he  could  secure  something 
for  his  children,  and  at  fifty  he  would  have  got  them 
that  independence  which  in  his  own  youth  he  had  so 
grievously  needed.     In  Weimar  his  relations  were  most 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  489 

agreeable,  he  said,  and  he  had  never  for  a  moment  re- 
gretted having  chosen  to  stay  on  there  instead  of  mov- 
ing to  Berlin.  Whatever  mortification  he  might  have 
felt  at  Beyme's  unwarrantable  silence  had  now  wholly 
passed ;  all  that  tormented  Mm  was  his  ruined  health, 
and  the  deplorable  state  of  German  hterature,  for  no 
new  writer  had  stood  forth  in  whom  one  could  take 
pleasure  or  pride. 

As  Schiller  put  no  great  strain  upon  his  physical 
powers,  his  health  at  this  time  was  tolerable.  He  had 
still  the  delight  of  meeting  Goethe,  and  Voss  would 
visit  him  on  afternoons,  who,  at  Schiller's  suggestion, 
was  adapting  "  Othello  "  for  the  German  stage.  On 
those  evenings  when  he  did  not  go  to  the  theatre,  he 
used  to  work.  Goethe  had  a  most  serious  attack  of 
his  malady  on  the  10th;  nevertheless,  in  two  days 
he  was  out  of  danger.  Schiller  sent  his  "  Homage " 
and  the  "  Phedre  "  translation  to  Dalberg,  who  mean- 
while at  Mainz  had  been  showing  all  honour  to  the 
newly  crowned  Napoleon.  By  the  middle  of  the  month 
Goethe,  following  the  doctor's  orders,  took  horse  exer- 
cise, and  thus  he  and  Schiller  missed  driving  out 
together.  As  long  as  Goethe  rode  every  day  he  felt 
well,  but  so  soon  as  he  discontinued  doing  so,  he 
became  ill.  The  work  that  then  occupied  him  was 
his  "  Winckelmann "  and  the  "  Notes "  to  Diderot's 
"  Neveu  de  Eameau,"  and  he  was  eagerly  hoping  to 
have  news  of  Schiller's  "Demetrius." 

At  length,  on  the  25th,  the  elder  of  the  friends 
visited  the  younger.  Goethe  now  felt  in  a  fair  way 
to  health,  and  he  spoke  of  staying  at  Dresden  in  the 
summer,  though  Schiller  knew  that  the  doctor  had 
doubts  as  to  his  complete  recovery.  Schiller  was 
anxious,  too,  about  his  own  state.  Though  the  milder 
season  should  bring  him  fresh  courage,  he  wrote  to 
Kcirner,  still  traces  would  remain,  he  feared,  of  these 
last  terrible  attacks;  if  life  and  moderate  health  did 


490  THE   LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

but  hold  out  until  his  fiftieth  year,  he  would  be  con- 
tent. Weakness  and  his  long  enforced  idleness  were 
causes  to  hinder  any  swift  progi-ess  with  the  "  Deme- 
trius." On  the  afternoon  of  the  28th,  before  Schiller 
attended  the  Sunday  court  assembly,  Voss  came  in 
as  usual,  and  helped  him  to  dress,  saying  how  well  he 
looked  in  his  green  court  dress,  which  was  now  a  more 
elaborate  one.  Goethe,  who  was  feeling  unwell,  came 
next  evening  as  Schiller  was  about  to  start  for  the 
theatre,  where  Spiesz's  "  Clara  von  Hoheneichen  "  was 
to  be  given.  Before  the  front  door  the  two  friends 
parted  ;  and  they  never  met  again.  On  this  day,  three 
years  since,  Schiller  had  moved  into  his  house.  At  the 
end  of  the  play,  when  Voss  went  into  Schiller's  box,  he 
found  him  in  a  high  fever,  with  chattering  teeth.  On 
reaching  home  they  brewed  some  punch,  wliich  the 
poet  used  occasionally  to  take  as  a  restorative.  But 
this  time  it  was  of  no  avail ;  he  never  again  sat  up  at 
his  writing-table,  where  after  his  death  they  found  the 
fair  copy  of  "  Marfa's  Monologue,"  the  last  thing,  per- 
haps, that  he  ever  wrote.  We  here  give  the  facsimile 
of  this. 

Next  day  Voss  found  him  lying  strengthless  upon 
a  couch.  "  Here  I  lie  again,"  was  all  he  could  say, 
in  a  faint,  hollow  voice ;  even  to  the  caresses  of  his 
children  he  gave  no  response.  He  could  take  no  nour- 
ishment, and  his  weakness  increased  so  rapidly  that 
a  bed  had  to  be  brought  into  his  study.  Travelling 
through  to  Leipzig,  Gotta  visited  the  sick  man,  and  left 
with  sad  forebodings.  Violent  attacks  of  spasms  now 
came  on,  and  during  the  sleepless  nights  Schiller  lay 
troubled  vdth  bitter  thoughts  as  to  his  suffering  wife 
and  the  children.  He  would  not  allow  Voss  to  watch 
at  his  bedside,  but  only  kept  faithful  Piudolf  as  his 
attendant.  As  ill  luck  would  have  it.  Stark,  his  doctor, 
and  Wolzogen  were  both  of  them  away,  ha\dng  gone 
with  the  court  to  Leipzig.      On  the  afternoon  of  the 


THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER  49^ 

5th,  after  a  herbal  bath,  he  felt  easier ;  ouce  more  hope 
of  hving  revived  in  him,  and  he  at  once  told  Cotta  and 
Wolzogen  of  his  improved  state.  But  that  night  his 
brain  was  again  attacked  ;  and  after  this  he  was  mostly 
delirious.  In  quiet  moments  it  was  a  pleasure  for  him 
to  have  his  dear  wife  and  her  sister  close  at  hand ;  but 
he  never  asked  to  see  the  children.  During  his  delirium 
he  repeated  passages  from  the  "  Demetrius,"  and  once, 
before  waking  from  sleep,  he  called  out :  "  Is  that  your 
hell  ?  Is  that  your  heaven  ? "  and  then  looked  upwards 
with  a  calm  smile.  He  had  dreamt  that  they  were 
plying  him  with  religious  exhortations.  When  in  the 
night  sharp  pains  seized  him,  he  cried  out  with  fer- 
vour :  "  O  thou  who  art  above,  save  me  from  suffering 
long!"  When  asked  how  he  felt,  he  rephed  that  it 
was  all  so  serene,  that  it  all  seemed  so  fair  to  him. 
Thus  to  the  weary  one  there  came  bright  \dsions  at  his 
journey's  close,  and  the  present  had  no  place  in  his 
thoughts.  He  never  asked  for  Goethe,  who  was  also 
at  that  time  stretched  upon  a  sick-bed.  In  the  last 
days,  he  took  Lotte's  hand  in  his,  and  said,  affection- 
ately, "  Dear,  good  one  ; "  then,  with  a  rarely  beautiful 
smile,  he  kissed  her  as  she  smoothed  the  pillows  about 
his  head.  He  had  fallen  into  calm  sleep,  and  Lotte, 
who,  trusting  to  his  good  constitution,  had  again  taken 
hope,  was  sitting  in  the  side-room.  Suddenly  they 
called  her,  for  a  violent  convulsion  had  seized  the 
sufferer ;  his  face  was  distorted  and  his  hands  cold. 
Then,  lightning-quick,  came  a  change  over  his  features  ; 
the  head  fell  back,  and  the  noble  heart  had  for  ever 
ceased  to  beat.  This  was  before  six  o'clock  on  the 
evening  of  the  9th  of  May,  the  month  of  blossoms, 
which  that  year  had  opened  in  wintry  gloom.  Schil- 
ler's spirit  had  battled  fiercely  with  the  shattered  body 
that  held  it,  until  at  last  his  vital  power  succumbed. 
Yet  one  might  almost  deem  him  fortunate  to  die  thus, 
gone  from  earth  without  long  and  painful  languishing. 


492  THE  LIFE  OF  SCHILLER 

in  the  zenith  of  his  powers,  when,  as  dramatic  poet,  his 
genius  had  won  its  most  glorious  triumphs.  In  the 
short  span  of  hfe  allotted  to  him  his  heart  had  enjoyed 
the  supremest  pleasures  of  love  and  of  friendship,  and, 
when  at  the  summit  of  his  fame,  he  was  upborne  by 
the  consciousness  that  through  his  own  energy  and 
perseverance,  undaunted  by  circumstance,  and  with 
never  a  stain  upon  his  honour,  he  had  reached  a  nota- 
ble place  in  the  world,  and  had  earned  the  love  and 
gratitude  of  the  German  nation,  which  was  to  draw 
such  benefit  from  the  writings  he  had  bequeathed  to 
them,  writings  whose  worth  must  ever  increase,  the 
more  we  learn  to  know  ourselves,  the  more  we  learn 
to  honour  what  is  really  excellent  in  poetry  and  in 
human  life. 


THE   END. 


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